An Emo and a Yautja II - The Sequel
by The Viscount Vampyre
Summary: This story picks up where 'An Emo and a Yautja' left off: As the injured Yautja huntress struggles without her human companion, a family struggles to stay together around tragedy, while clandestine forces begin to spider their way into the fray. Please check out part one too! Thank you!
1. Chapter 1

An Emo and a Yautja – The Squeak-quel

Miles away from where she had left her pet human, a limping female Yautja made her way through the darkness of the jungle.

Though she wasn't alone… Following her spoor and foot tracks were members of the black uniformed team she'd seen earlier that day.

She'd had to kill a few to make sure of her egress, but they were no match for her, even in her present condition.

After cutting them deeply and throwing the two human males aside the huntress slipped through the other soldier's sights.

As she limped she thought to herself, about the previous days, and about her encounters with those three bad bloods.

Right now, however, her wounds were bad, and she was not in a good way. Especially since she knew that she was going to have to patch herself up.

Like most hunters she hadn't anyone to rely on for aid, and she had nothing other than what she had brought with her on her small ship.

Recounting this to herself caused her to rumble and groan with a seething rage, matched only by her pain.

Stomping through the woods the huntress' mood was not a positive one to say the least.

Especially as her thoughts turned to the perpetrators of her wounds; the bad bloods.

'I failed… I couldn't kill a single one outright…'

She leapt over a log and created a false trail by breaking some branches and deliberately smearing some blood.

She knew she was being pursued, but these were humans, and these were not human hunters.

They were far too loud, slow, and boisterous to ever catch her, but she didn't want them to be lead to her ship either.

After setting the false tracks she continued on her previous course, and so did her thoughts.

'My Little Jake… is dead… I know it, I can feel it…'

She parted some brushes and passed through them, careful not to break anymore branches than necessary,

'I… I feel like I will die soon too.'

A voice within her shook, 'No… we cannot until we see him again… Until we see and know that he is alive or dead.'

'But… I don't even know how I would find him…'

Tawaya stopped mid stride and slowed.

Her hope flew from her as she leaned forwards.

She looked down her body, her thigh was still bleeding, and her side's sutures had almost all opened. In addition to these, her last fight with a bad blood had given her many more wounds.

She was exhausted and had to get to her ship. She needed to patch herself up and she needed to survive.

'I can find him… So long as he is on this island. I will find him.'

Nodding to herself she continued, dodging low hanging branches and vines, picking up a renewed pace.

"I've got to keep going…"

She clicked her tusks in her mask as a memory flashed through her mind; and it was of her and Jake on the beach.

"Why do you like covering yourself Little Jake?"

He opened his eyes and shrugged his shoulders, responding with his beautifully lyrical voice; "Well, why do you insist on being naked?"

His tone… He was so, so… defiant! Always! Despite her size, and despite his, he had this tone of defiance and resistance.

He had this way of being that was at times puzzling and endearing, or paradoxically submissive and headstrong.

It was funny, because after their brief conversation on the beach she'd then gotten the small human to rub her.

It was strange but she enjoyed his touch in an innocent sort of way.

It was unique as well; no one else had ever touched her like that.

The whole way that she was with him, she realised that there was no one else she'd ever be able to share with like it again.

That moment was… Wonderful… and more than that it happened on her beach…

Then she stopped herself.

'No; _our_ beach'

Then she nodded; nothing in her brutal upbringing or in her brutish culture allowed for such intimacy.

Or for such feelings

But it was something special to her, and she started thinking in a language completely foreign to her kind: 'It was special to 'us'.'

She thought of herself and her pet, her Little Jake, as something more.

The time they had spent together, especially there on that beach was… Different, it was genuinely special to her.

And somehow she knew that it was special to him too, it must have been. She could feel it.

Then her thoughts changed, 'he's not… not a 'pet' he's…'

She struggled with the thoughts, especially with the fact that she was still making sure she was moving the right direction.

But eventually her thoughts continued. 'He's just… My Little Jake…'

She scoffed, 'he really is small… Poor creature…'

Then guilt reared its ugly head within her chest.

'I shouldn't have left him like that… with those strangers to him… alone.'

She shook her head as her emotions from their parting returned; 'I should have held him longer…'

Her chest heaved heavily as she felt knots tighten around her lungs, 'I shouldn't have left him! Damn it all…'

She slowed and punched a tree in aggravation; she wanted to roar as loud as she could, but instead she muted herself and growled lowly.

"Little Jake… my little human… Why did he have to be so fragile?"

Then guilt stabbed her again, 'Why did you have to be so slow to kill the bad blood?'

She shook her head and tried to push her feelings away.

There was still her own situation to deal with, and she wasn't going to get any better staying here.

'I've got to keep moving… I've got to see him again…'

She resumed her course and kept on towards her craft, she still had something to live for.

There was still much left to do… And for some strange reason, a feeling that also drove her was that she didn't want to let him down…

-1-

"We need a trauma surgeon and a cardiovascular surgeon. Blood pressure is low, very low. So is respiration. We may need to intubate."

Above the sound of the attendants a nurse yelled to a fellow nurse down the hall. "We're going to need a crash cart!"

The nurse down the hall began wheeling the cart into the quartered off ER section behind some blue hanging drapes. Announcing and clearing the way by yelling: "Crash cart! Crash cart make way!"

The attending ER doctor arrived and immediately took charge, "Okay, keep pressure, I need coagulants on these wounds."

Pushing his stethoscope into his ears he placed the end onto the bloody chest of their patient and listened.

"Belay that crash cart, we have a pulse." Turning to a waiting attendant he continued, "We need three units of oh-negative, now."

"Okay intubation? Where's my tube!"

Looking from one side to the other the doctor waited and quickly the nurse who'd previously pushed the crash cart prepared and handed the tool to the doctor.

Punctuating the action and indicating the arrival of the item, "Doctor!"

Taking hold of the tubing the doctor began inserting it into the mouth and began directing it into the trachea.

As he did he asked, "Status on the respirator?"

There was a slight pause, the sensors of the heart rate and vitals monitor came on, filling the small area with the beeping and whirr of electric noise.

A nurse then announced "Okay! Respirator standing by"

The statement was repeated by the doctor and the attending team began moving again.

"Tube in" turning to the nurse on the machine the doctor continued, "Respirator?"

"Here."

Clicking on the machine, fresh air began being pumped through the tubing in a steady flow.

"Okay respiration successful," The doctor then turned and after touching the arm of another nurse and pointing he continued, "We need to stabilise and move to surgery, now."

The nurse nodded and headed out from the hanging blue drapes and down the hall.

Yelling after the nurse the doctor continued, "Tell surgery we're on our way now!"

"Scissors, now, you get those scissors ready. These clothes need to be off."

A nurse carefully began cutting the tight fitting blood soaked black shirt and after getting close to the blade protruding from the wound in his chest the rest of the shirt tore and gave away.

Pulling the two sides of the shirt away from the wound and chest the doctor inspected the blade embedded deeply into the lower end of the ribcage.

"We're going to need a cardiothoracic surgeon. Lung's been punctured."

Responding to the doctor's observation a nurse announced "The cardiovascular surgeon has been called.

The doctor nodded, "Brief him and tell him that the lung has been punctured as well."

"We need a decompression needle, clean an area on his chest."

Handing the doctor a four inch needle he waited as a nurse swabbed a square area with antiseptic.

"Okay, inserting now."

Piercing the pale flesh with the long metal needle the doctor heard the sound of some exiting air, but it slowed and stopped.

The doctor looked him over, "Not good, okay…"

"Failure to reflate the lung…"

Looking to each of the attending nurses the ER doctor nodded, "Okay people we're moving him now."

Hitting the locks under the rolling bed the team began to walk alongside the fast moving gurney out the ER triage and towards one of the ER operating rooms.

"I need the surgery team ready and in there stat."

One of the nurses responded, "surgery is in and standing by."

"Out of the way!" was the chorus from the team as they made it to the double doors labeled 'operating theatre'.

Moving through the doors the ER doctor handed off responsibility to the surgery team and briefly answered the few questions that they had for him.

The doors to surgery closed and the team began their work, while at the admissions desk of the ER the family; a man, a woman, and a young lady had just arrived.

-2-

The hospital staff spoke Spanish, and the arriving family was speaking in English initially. But quickly the father began to use the Spanish he knew.

At the appearance of the family amongst the populated ER two suited men approached the admission desk and interrupted the discussion between the nurse sitting behind the counter and the family.

The larger of the two agents began speaking, in English, to the father.

"Sir, please we'd ask you to not stop their work."

The father turned from the nurse and looked between the men.

Government types, he assumed. He had met with a few of them before in his work, but nothing like these two.

"Where's my son." He spoke sternly.

The men quietly looked back at the father.

"Diana, take Clair and go wait over there." He indicated the heavily populated waiting area seats.

Diana, tears in her eyes nodded hesitantly and placed her hands on Clair's shoulders. The girl was crying heavily, tears streaming down her face, causing her hair to cling to her cheeks in unflattering clumps.

Walter pulled out his wallet and removed an identification card.

The two agents looked at each other before turning back to Walter.

"We can speak over here Sir."

The three moved away from the desk to an area away from people and Walter finished removing the red and white card.

"Look I don't know why you men are here, I don't care. But here is my intelligence card, with my clearance level."

One of the agents, the smaller of the two, took the card and looked at it.

Walter continued, "I am not 'name-dropping' but I regularly do business with Director 'Hal' from Defence, as well as Secretary 'Key'. I am also friends with the US ambassador who's been assigned to this country… There are a few others I could name but I won't… I don't think I have to."

The two agents looked at each other unsurely, surprised with the calm voice and the high level credentials of the plain, average, looking man in front of them.

"If you are from what I think you're part of then you'll also know those two men's real names."

Walter shook his head, regretfully, and breathed heavily before looking back to his wife and daughter.

"I want to know, where my son is."

The larger of the two agents spoke first while his colleague returned Walter's card.

"As far as we know he's in surgery…"

Walter nodded and exhaled.

"As for the situation…" The large agent faltered and then the smaller one continued, "At the beginning we thought it was cartel activity."

"Embassies were called and we have allocated agents to ensure the security of nationals…" motioning the agent continued, "We were sent from the embassy's ATF-FBI joint task force…"

The agent leaned… and hesitated.

"Look… Sir… Some other guys are going to be arriving soon. We've been told they're going to have superior authority, and will be taking charge of the situation on the island…"

Walter furrowed his brow. "This isn't cartel?" The men shook their heads as they relaxed. Assured that the man they were talking to wasn't just another 'civilian'.

Reading the two men's demeanour changing Walter now asserted his personality, and his authority.

The control of the situation had shifted from the suited agents to the man in casual dress-wear.

Walter was actually understating his level of authority and clearance, but that didn't really matter at the moment.

Though he was private sector now, Walter had a history with intelligence and agent-dominated communities. All of which now resurfaced in his otherwise calm voice:

"Then what the fuck has happened here?"

Both agents looked exacerbated and felt pressed to answer, both feeling like they were in the presence of a pseudo-superior; "We don't know Sir…"

"Was it political then? Do you know who was shot?"

The one agent rubbed his stubble, audibly scratching the hair as he did.

"Local federal chatter was concerned about a few politicians at the hotel… but, it sounded like they got them out."

"Who was hit then? The police and federal SWAT weren't too chatty…" Walter lowered his voice.

"Even one of my own men is missing."

The larger of the two brought out his phone and quickly ran through it before speaking,

"The man who was shot was an American, we ID-d him as soon as we arrived here, then we ran a check through FBI, his home state, and Interpol, our office then came back that he was clean."

Walter nodded, "No motive?"

"None…"

"And the other men… What else has happened?"

The agents once again looked unsure, "We just don't know Sir."

"In total there were five people injured or attacked…"

The man spoke almost in a whisper now, "Sir… something very strange is going on here."

Walter nodded again, "Thank you gentlemen…"

He quietly turned away from them, "What's the name of the ATF supervisor out of the embassy?"

The two men hesitated, until the smaller spoke. "Karce…"

"Thank you, you've both been helpful." Walter's voice was genuine, and he was glad that the two agents didn't decide to give him a hard time.

The truth was that minus his work, minus everything he'd done, or been part of, Walter was a father, and he loved his children.

Walter turned from the two agents and quickly walked back to his waiting family, assuring them everything was going to be alright.

The smaller of the two agents moved back to the admissions nurse and spoke to him, making it clear that the tourist family was there for the recently admitted young man, and that there would be no problems for them during the young man's stay.

It was several hours later, but the family had since been moved by hospital staff to the waiting area of the intensive care unit of the hospital.

This hospital was the largest on the island, and, thankfully, also the best equipped.

Walter's new friends at the ATF later assured him that the press, as well as the local authorities would not bother them for any reason.

Walter's name, as well as his connections with the US embassy on the island, as well as his own country's ambassador, ensured that there was going to be a press-blackout for the time being.

Until all the 'proper' investigators arrived, and the story was 'straightened out', nothing about the events at the hotel, or the fact that Walter's son was injured, was going to get out if they could help it. Everything else was still fair game but as far as Walter's family went, they weren't there.

There were definite perks to working with politicians and shady defense contractors.

While it was decorated differently; it had nicer chairs, it had wall furnishings, it had warm lighting, and it had free-flowing coffee and other 'comforts' the ICU waiting area of a hospital was still a part of the hospital; and so it smelled like one…

And it felt like one; the air was tinged with the smell of antiseptic, of medicine, and of sick.

It smelt like death, and not the smell that one gets out in the bush hunting, or on a city street.

It was slow death, weakening death; the kind that no one can really do much about, and it requires not only the best on the part of the doctors, but luck to survive it.

Walter and Diana shared a seat and held each other quietly while Clair was curled up asleep in a ball on the couch.

It was about an hour and a half of quiet since the two adults' last spoke, but Diana finally broke the humming silence of the room.

"What are we going to do next Walt?"

Looking upwards and rubbing his wife's shoulder the man looked, for the first time in his life, old.

His voice was tired and his body was tired.

And it culminated in his words, "I don't know."

Diana's voice quavered, "This isn't the first time we've waited for him like this…"

Walter shook his head and couldn't help but let a curt huff escape his mouth.

Dejectedly he responded in agreement, "No… it isn't"

By now the light of the sun had gone down, and the windows became a rich, dark blue.

The city scape outside may have hid the sunset from their view, but it still shone a beautiful orange over the watery bay which the city surrounded.

Walter looked upwards towards the window and thought about the sidewalk down below.

"I almost want to go down the street and see if I could get some blankets or something for you and Clair… But…" he closed his eyes and rubbed his face.

"I don't want to leave until the doctors come out…"

Diana stifled a dry sob as she shook her head, she had heard him but the words didn't quite register, she was too consumed with her own thoughts.

And her own guilt;

"I didn't make enough of an effort with him Walt…"

Walter shook and wrapped his masculine arms around her, touching her tanned and softened skin.

"Diana that's not true… Don't say that damn it…"

His voice came out louder and more forceful than he had intended, and Clair stirred slightly and opened her eyes.

At the same time, coming down the hall was a woman in scrubs.

After the form of the doctor registered through her tired daze Clair shot upwards and pointed with eyes fully awake now; "Mom… Dad…"

Walter stopped mid-sentence.

Diana held her breath and kept her eyes shut.

Clair's lip and chin quivered.

Walter stood and reluctantly let go of Diana's hand.

The Hispanic woman in scrubs cleared her throat and spoke with a lightly accented voice.

"I am Claudia Arroyo, chief trauma surgeon for Hospital de San Vicente." She moved her hands behind her back as she spoke.

"Earlier today we admitted via medical helicopter a young male in his early twenties we identified as your son… we assessed his condition and immediately succeeded in stabilising and intubating him to prepare for surgery."

Diana stood and carefully began to clutch onto her husband. Behind them Clair rose from her seat and adjusted her loose fitting brother's sweater, while they all continued to hold their breath.

"We succeeded in removing a twenty centimetre blade from his chest, and we were able to stop the majority of his internal bleeding."

She brought a hand to her brow and wiped some sweat as she blinked with heavy eye lids.

"We have been able to re-inflate his lung, and after four hours we have been able to effectively address his condition."

"The blade pierced not only his left lung, but also his stomach, in addition to breaking two ribs on entry."

She paused and took a breath.

"Total surgery time was just under six hours and we were able to remove the major pieces of bone from his body and patch the internal injuries."

"So I am pleased to inform you that, at the moment, the surgery has been a success, and that your son's immediate post-operative condition is satisfactory."

Walter was stunned and stood noiselessly while Clair and Diana both let out cries of joy.

Diana pressed her face into Walter's shoulder and Clair gleefully walked towards Claudia.

"C-can we see him?" the girl finally choked out through her tears and excitement.

The doctor turned and looked regretfully at the girl, "At the moment we are cleaning him and preparing a room in the ICU…"

"When he has been moved, and we have assessed him to still be stable we will inform you."

She nodded and then turned to leave down the corridor she came from, just before she escaped from view Walter threw off his daze and blurted out: "Thank you…"

He turned and the three hugged each other tightly, silently hoping that the worst was now over.

-3-


	2. Chapter 2

AEAY II - Chapter Two

Tawaya arrived at her ship as the sun started to dim and set.

She pressed the button to lift up her ship's ramp and she entered into the dark metal cabin of her small craft.

Re-cloaking the ship she sat down on one of the supply crates and threw her head upwards.

Closing her eyes she allowed herself a moment of reprieve; then took a deep breath.

Her work had begun.

She removed her mask and looked at the laid out medical instruments from her last impromptu surgery.

Placing the heavy metal helmet onto the floor beside the makeshift medical table she undressed her weapons, light armour, wrist gauntlets, and webbing; everything unnecessary until she was only in underwear.

Then she began going at herself, first cleaning off the dried blood and then the wet blood as best she could.

She'd bled a lot, but Yautja could replenish and regenerate themselves at a faster rate than humans. Not to say that it was instantaneous or in a style like a superhero, but it was generally a quicker process.

Though Tawaya desired to speed along this process, she was intent on getting herself together as best as possible and then going back out.

Her hunter's reason however was telling her not to.

Hunting is good but hunting takes time.

Following tracks, spoors, other indicators of activity and avoiding pack trails from the activity of local populace that were not hunted, and learned to notice specifically the activity of the populace you were hunting.

It took days, and it was a slow process during each of those days.

It required calm and it needed level headed reasoning to think through and plan, to work around the things in the environment.

What had possessed her however, wasn't really any of those things.

She was not being a hunter, and this was definitely not hunting.

It was rage, it was emotion, it was passion, and it was revenge.

And to a Yautja, revenge was a pursuit that was always bound to failure if not planned out carefully and done 'in time' as opposed to as soon as possible.

As part of her upbringing she knew this, but she wanted it now.

She wanted to be in fighting condition, even if that meant just barely.

With all this in mind, Tawaya, apprehensively, took hold of a long syringe and began injecting her bloodstream with another dose of what could only be described as a medical cocktail of steroids.

The dosage would kill a human a couple of times over, but it was the kind of thing that a Yautja was used to, and could easily handle.

Within reason of course, it wasn't advisable that a Yautja utilize chemistry too much, many a bad blood has been created from drug dependence and psychological upheaval.

The Yautja are… hair trigger stable to say the least, throw in psychotropic drugs, dependency, and psychosis, and you've got an eight foot wrecking ball of rage, cunning, and visceral strength.

Tawaya herself was always able to sparingly use medical substances only when she needed them, and she begrudgingly did so.

There was nothing she felt to fear over use or reliance on such things.

After the steroids began their alien work repairing the torn and ripped muscle and skin layers in her body cell by cell, Tawaya took hold of her thick, leather-needle like pin and thread and began re-suturing her major wounds.

She growled and grumbled uncomfortably as she went about her thread-work; she'd never been good at threading, needle point, or knitting, but when it came to her own skin she looked like a master seamstress.

Perhaps it was the stakes she was playing that spurred her to be as good as she had gotten, and she laughed that her skills on her skin had never made the jump to her crafting ability.

In between each stitch she was applying her coagulant and still cleaning away blood.

It was tiring work and the way she was sitting was awkwardly bent over.

She felt worn out.

Mid stitch she paused and had to slowly bring her head upwards.

Tawaya was breathing deeply, but no matter how even or controlled her breaths were her head still felt off.

It must have been the adrenaline petering out…

Or the amount of blood she'd lost…

No… it was everything; the day, her Jake, the wounds, the pain, the lack of blood, the chemicals, the hormones. Everything had pushed her and pushed her, and now doing the simplest task was taking an unnecessary amount of focus and effort.

Letting go of her needle with one hand and raising the other off her skin she brought both hands to her face and wiped her crest, and then lifted her dread locks to wave air underneath them to her neck.

Then it hit her like a bullet, her eyes fluttered and she felt like she was to vomit. She tried rising from her seated position but instead of standing she stumbled forwards, knocking her medical tools onto the floor and hitting the crate they were on with her shoulder as she fell.

She had gone entirely limp and the fall was the result of her losing consciousness.

When she eventually awoke, she was surrounded by her discarded bloody cloths and the broken glass of crushed ampules.

Tawaya was too sore, she ached, and her body was telling her a firm 'no'.

She wasn't going anywhere.

After regaining consciousness, she tried to get up; she moved her hands under her torso and went to push down, getting her chest and head up and off the ground.

But she couldn't.

Her anger and the rest of her emotions gave way to pain.

She hurt, all over; muscles were pulled, muscles were cut, her chest was stabbed, blood had been lost, pride had been lost…

Her Little Jake had been lost.

The only movement she managed to do was she was able to push herself onto one side.

After doing so she brought up her wrist. The only things she hadn't removed from her person, other than her undergarment, were her bracelets.

Some were leather, some were woven, and some were wrapped with hair from great beasts she'd personally hunted. But the one that stood out the most against her spotted skin was the one she'd received from Jake.

It was a flat black, but was adorned with letter characters and shapes that had vibrant dyes.

It looked beautiful to her, though she didn't know how or where Jake had gotten it. And she didn't know what its words meant.

But it reminded her of Jake, and that was all she needed.

She brought it close to her face and after looking it over closely she closed her eyes and held her wrist against her forehead.

There was a reverence towards it now, it was from Little Jake yes, but… there was something more to it than just that. She was at a loss as to properly articulate it; there was an additional emotion or sentiment.

Though she couldn't place it, Tawaya wasn't a poet.

She adored listening to any Yautja poet or Chief recite lyrics, epics, ballads, and old written works.

But she learned in her youth she had no talent for it, which was the altercation that lead to her taking her brothers eye… if she remembered correctly.

All such things aside, Tawaya cleared her mind and quietly lay with her wrist close to her eyes.

Looking at her 'piece' of Jake, in pain, and entirely missing him.

-1-

The rhythmic beeping of the VS monitor punctuated the chorus created by the respiration machine in the small ICU room that Jake had been moved to.

He'd regained consciousness once after the surgery while they were moving him, but was far too sedated to do anything.

The second time he woke up it was early in the morning, and before the hospital had allowed his family to see him.

It was good that they weren't present; in the delirium of waking up he had pulled his respiration tube out.

In his vain tugging and gagging he ended up tearing quite a bit of his throat and when he finally removed it, the total strain had ended up splitting some of his sutures.

The staff then had to move him out the ICU, sedate, and then check over the work they just finished to make sure he wasn't going to start bleeding internally again.

It took several hours, and it pushed the admittance of Jake's family back quite a while, but it was necessary.

After ensuring that he hadn't split or damaged any of the internal patches or stitches, the hospital staff determined that he didn't require the respiration tube, and that keeping him sedated any longer would not be beneficial.

Then, when they were finished he'd been cleaned up again, and was returned to the ICU, unaware of any of this though was his family, who had been stressfully waiting outside the ward in the empty lounge.

Diana had gotten some sleep in the waiting room, the same with Clair. Both had also begrudgingly eaten at the hospital cafeteria. This wasn't because of the quality of the food; it was mostly because of the stress of the situation.

They didn't want to do anything other than wait at the ICU doors.

The two women were so focused on everything else they didn't even notice the taste of what they had eaten; they only knew that they needed the energy.

Walter however had ferried back to the hotel, gotten his wife and daughter clean clothes and brought some things they might need.

He hadn't eaten since the previous day; he also hadn't slept since then either.

But Walter was used to days without sleep, or real meals, and stress.

He was well acquainted with stress.

Though this stress that took a greater toll than anything he'd gone through in his professional life.

Walter was presently on his way back in their rental car to the hospital when Jake finally woke up for longer than a few minutes.

Despite tearing his throat he was able to talk, but barely.

At the moment he woke up, one of the nurses was in the room.

His voice was dry, and raspy, he sounded like he had suddenly earned a voice akin to a sixty year old smoker.

Blinking the dry crust from his eyes he began to look around slowly until he settled on the nurse.

"Clair… is Clair okay…"

The words were barely audible, and there was a large amount of rough mumbling before and after the four discernible words.

After assuring and touching Jake's shoulder, the nurse changed his IV and quietly left the room.

Checking with the ICU's supervising doctor the nurse then exited the ward and informed the waiting Clair and Diana that he was awake, and that only one of them could enter the room to see him.

Diana looked to Clair and the young girl meekly left her mother's side and followed the nurse to his room.

The nurse was tall and thin with lightly tanned skin and blond highlights throughout her dark brown hair. She was Hispanic, but she wasn't like the citizens of the island, she looked different but of course Clair couldn't place it.

She wasn't as worldly as her parents.

Or even Jake.

Truth was she was putting most of her persona on for show.

And right now she was just a scared girl, worried about her brother…

The nurses' accent was very strong, and her speech was slow as she carefully formed her words.

"At first just one at a time…" She paused as Clair and the nurse began walking through the ICU doors.

"Then after a little while, if he responds well, and he's still…" she stopped struggling for the right word in English.

"Stable, si, if he is still stable and okay. Then rest of you may see."

Before they disappeared through the open double doors Clair waved to her mother and stifled a sob before walking with the nurse down the hallway and into the unit.

The same doctor from the previous night had just arrived and nodded to the nurse as they got closer to Jake's room.

The nurse quietly walked off as the doctor greeted Clair.

"Good afternoon… I hope you are feeling better since last night."

Clair wiped her nose, "Yeah… I could barely sleep but… yes…"

She stopped herself and just nodded slightly.

The doctor nodded, "It may be a bit of a shock to see him, but he was calling for you specifically."

She took a breath and lightly touched the side of Clair's arm.

"When you talk to him, it doesn't matter so much what you say but how."

Clair nodded and looked intensely at the door to his room.

"Stay positive, upbeat; avoid negative language or being loud. It will help him a lot."

The doctor took a breath as she reluctantly continued, "He pulled his breathing tube out himself earlier this morning so his voice may be a little raw or rough sounding. Now he can't have anything acidic or carbonated."

The doctor finally turned the handle to the door and slowly opened it, lowering her voice as she did so.

"On the side table there I've left a cup of ice chips, you can if you want, help him with those. They're good to bring down the swelling and the soreness."

Clair nodded again, holding back her tears and breath.

Then she entered the room, quietly and slowly like a mouse, Clair took a few steps in; eyes transfixed on the bed in the centre of the small room.

Lying under some thin light blue covers was her brother.

He had bruises on his face and his lips were chapped and rough.

Other than the reddish spots of irritation or of bruises his skin was pale, almost entirely devoid of colour.

His black and purple hair had been pushed out of his face and was brushed to either side of his cheeks, but out of habit, the bangs had fallen back over his eyes.

At the moment his eyes were closed and his chest moved slowly up and down. He was breathing on his own but it was a horrible sound; a wheezing, straining sound emanated loudly from him.

It filled the room and immediately made Clair uncomfortable.

As she got closer she could see his features.

His face was partially turned towards the other side of the room; sunlight was coming in through two large windows but the shutters evenly broke up the light and left dark bars of shadow across his face.

Dr. Arroyo quietly spoke before closing the door behind Clair. "I'll leave you…"

Clair cleared her throat and tried her best to stay calm.

'Positive… positive and quiet…' she thought.

Finally she had enough courage.

"Jake?"

She said.

He stirred under the light. His cheeks winced and his eyes moved under their lids. He recognised the sound, it was familiar but he hadn't really 'heard' it.

"Jake?" she tried again a little louder than before, but still softly.

His eyes opened and his head slowly turned.

He looked tired, and more than that he looked sick.

'More than usual' Clair thought.

She would have laughed if she wasn't so overcome with seeing him awake.

He looked up and finally his eyes lazily came to Clair.

It took a moment to focus but eventually he recognised her and his eyes, though dilated and coming down from being heavily medicated, lit up with joy at the sight of his sister.

He tried to raise a hand and he moved his chin upwards to swallow as he attempted to talk.

"C-Cla." He dryly coughed, "Clar"

He tried swallowing again as his breathing laboriously grew louder for a few breaths.

"Clair…"

His face had lit up through sedated and slowed glee.

She walked closer to him and tears began to flow down her cheeks, she extended her hands and took hold of his arm.

Pushing the covers down off his shoulders she was able to tightly grasp his hand, his face began to convey relief.

'She was okay'

Clair knew what he was thinking, and she couldn't help but nod her head at her brother.

"You… ok?"

He managed to get out.

Clair leaned closer to his bed and brought his thin, light, hand to her face.

Pressing the cool flesh against her warm cheek she shut her eyes and loudly sobbed before nodding and agreeing.

"Yes… I'm okay Jake…"

She rubbed her eye with her free hand and continued, "You are too, you know? You're okay now…"

Jake's eyes were so heavy, he couldn't hold them open anymore and they involuntarily closed.

"You're okay… your little sister's here now…"

She slowly lowered his hand back to where it was at his side, and carefully replaced the covers. Tucking him in with a care and loving grace a doctor or a nurse couldn't provide their patients.

Then she leaned to his cheek and kissed it.

She wanted to hug him, she wanted to wrap her arms around his neck and hold him closely.

She wanted to tell him she was stupid and missed him, and that she was scared, and thought he was going to die…

And she wanted to confess that she felt she had always been a shitty little sister to him, even when he was right, even when he was doing what he was supposed to, all the times he covered for her, looked out for her, got her and her friends stuff,

Clair felt like she had so much to say to him, but she didn't even know where to begin; 'sorry', and 'thank you for everything' just didn't seem like enough.

It's funny how all these small things seem to spring into a persons' mind when faced with something traumatising or close to loss.

-2-

For the rest of the day, Jake drifted in and out of wakefulness.

Sometimes he'd be able to stay awake for close to an hour, but for the majority of it he would pass out for about ten minutes or so, and then be awake for about the same amount of time.

Clair was able to stay with him for almost two hours, during which time she helped him get some water, carefully rubbing the ice chips along his mouth and lips.

"S-sorry about this…"

He would say, coughing a very weak laugh.

"It's okay Jake… I don't mind… but this is about all I'm willing to do."

She smiled and laughed sharply, the laugh hollowed out with an emotional groan.

Then he would just close his eyes and be out like a light.

The first time it happened it scared her, but then after rushing to get a nurse and she explained to her that it was normal, Clair became okay with the intermittent consciousness.

Okay… How can someone be okay with that?

She could 'handle it' is probably a better way to say it.

Sitting in the chair beside his bed she would just talk. At first it was awkward, trying to talk to someone who was injured and asleep, but eventually she got the hang of it.

It didn't matter what she was talking about, so long that it was soft, quiet, and positive, she told herself.

As she spoke Clair started to remember all sorts of things that the two of them did when they were younger… and closer.

How'd she push him away so much? She thought.

'He did change though…' she nodded as her cheeks twitched and her eyes moistened, 'he did a lot of pushing us all away too…'

She told him everything that had been going on for her lately, like they were old friends again; she talked about the classes she was looking forwards at school, some of the things she and her girlfriends did over the summer, she talked about her clubs, teams, even some of the few books she'd read during the last semester.

It was a beautiful moment between them, because not only had Clair gotten her older brother back, but the pretension was gone, the forced closeness wasn't present, it was honest, it was real, her brother had saved her life.

And now she could, in a small way, help save his…

Eventually though Clair's' story telling had to come to an end as nurse came to break the horrible news that she would have to leave the room.

Clair nodded reluctantly, and stood from the Ikea-like chair.

Touching her brother's arm through the covers she quietly said her goodbye,

"I'll be back soon, okay? Dad and Mom will be in too, you know, to see you…"

She shut her eyes strongly, "You just…" she took a breath and continued, "You keep getting better…"

Before her eyes could start streaming she turned and walked towards the nurse waiting by the open door.

She was okay to leave right now, but if she stayed any longer she knew it would have been too hard.

'He was okay' she thought, 'he's okay…'

Relieved, and tiredly, Clair walked with her nurse escort down the hallway and back into the waiting room, greeted happily by Walter and Diana.

She couldn't help but nod and smile through the tears as she told them he was okay.


	3. Chapter 3

AEAY II – Chapter Three

After Clair had been reunited with her family outside of the ICU three men in suits had arrived out of the elevator down the hall.

As soon as the doors would allow, the three tall men began speed-walking down the corridor towards the ICU.

The family at first didn't look at them, but the noise they made as their dress brogues clicked on the linoleum floor and their chatter drew Walter, Diana, and Clair's eyes.

They spoke in English, loudly, and didn't have discernable accents.

They were American…

One was on his cell phone speed talking, while the other two conversed closely.

The centre man was the leader and the one he was speaking with had in his hand a dossier of some kind, pointing towards it as he spoke.

The leader nodded with each point of information he received.

Walter furrowed his brow.

He had a feeling he knew who these men were, and where they were from.

The leader extended his hand and forcefully opened one of the doors to the ICU and the three men entered.

Immediately behind the doors the family could hear the protests of the nurses.

-1-

Jake had come to, at first he was troubled and his chest became heavy.

He could hear yelling? Or something … Someone was loudly talking outside of the room.

Then he heard voices and steps closer and closer to the door.

Eventually the door swung open and two men in suits entered.

Jake looked from man to man and through the spaces in-between them he could see the nurses yelling at a third man who blocked the doorway.

After the two men entered the room the third pulled it shut.

Lying still and staring at the men Jake tried to stay focused.

Jake looked from one to the other expectantly as the awkwardness in the room continued to build.

Clearing his throat one of the men finally spoke; "Are you the kid that was stabbed?"

Jake nodded groggily.

The men looked at each other before the one who spoke continued.

"You are going to tell us everything that happened yesterday building up to and during the events when you were injured."

Jake, while still a little delirious, immediately became anxious. He started to feel scared. He felt like he was in trouble.

But these guys were not cops…

He never even thought about how he'd explain anything to his parents, or cops, or… whoever these people were.

He didn't plan on anything really…

Of course he didn't… he was in shock before, and was fairly certain he was going to die.

Not only that, but he thought he did die.

He last remembered being carried by Tawaya, just after getting 'shot' with the blade.

Before now he actually hadn't gone through his own memories to try and recollect anything.

But now, the presence of these two, huge, serious, unknown men had scared the shit out of him.

His voice cracked dryly, "I…"

Jake coughed and closed his eyes, "I don't know… I don't know you…"

The one agent looked to his superior uneasily, "Sherbrook… he's still so fucked up… I think we were too early Sir."

Waving his hand in the other's face Agent Sherbrook walked closer to Jake's bed and took hold of the side rail.

Then he leant in.

"You saw them didn't you?"

Jake was being stared at by this man and now that he was closer he could see his features.

The man's face bore pock marks and what appeared to be burn scars.

Through the scars his wrinkles began to show, they were stress caused, they must have been.

He didn't look like he should have been that old…

His hair was blonde, slicked backwards with oil and sweat. It was thinning and losing its colour, but unaffected by age his eyebrows were thick, and straw blonde, showing what the top of his head used to have.

But the most striking thing about him was his eyes.

They were emerald green, and mad, mad as all hell.

He wildly searched Jake's face for any minute tick of emotion.

And he repeated the question; "You saw them…"

Jake knew what he was talking about, but worse than that, the man could tell that Jake knew.

Satisfied the Agent Sherbrook let go of Jake's bed and stepped back, in awe.

"How many?"

Jake squinted and tried to move his head, "Who… are you?"

The man shook his head and took off his jacket.

"Nah, that's not how this works kid."

He folded the blue suit jacket and hung it over the edge of the chair near the foot of the bed.

He loosened his tie and shook his shoulders.

"Woo… But I will tell you this, I am excited kid, this is better than Christmas, _mhmm_ let me tell you…"

He huffed and finished placing the jacket, before continuing.

"Now I repeat, how many?"

Jake chest began to hurt, breathing was laborious, and he started to feel his lungs getting tighter.

"Look… sir… I, I don't know who you are or... Like what's going… on."

Jake winced as he finished speaking.

The agent stuck out his tongue and bit it, loudly grunting "Uh huh…"

He brought the chair from the end of the bed closer to Jake's side and sat down in it.

"Kid… I'll be honest with you a little bit here. My job is very difficult as it is… I've done things I…"

He paused looked upwards and scoffed,

"I don't like and… Right now, I don't want to have to 'make' you talk. Do you understand?"

Jake's eyes widened and he stared at the man with now sober clarity.

"Look I don't remem-"

The man raised his hand, cutting him off.

"I read your file, and looked at you here; you seem lucid and aware enough. Don't bullshit me."

Jake breathed lightly, wincing again at the pain building in his chest.

"N-no… I don't" he groaned, "I don't have to talk to you…" he stuttered painfully, "Assholes."

The agent laughed and then turned around to his partner, laughing louder, forcing it.

Then he turned back to Jake stone-faced, rubbing his mouth and the sides of his cheeks.

He grabbed the sides of the chair and scooted it even closer to Jake's bed.

Clearing his throat he extended his hand towards Jake's face.

It was an uncomfortable movement, it was slow, and moved in a pantomime.

It was an affectionate way, and he slowly ran his fingers past the side of Jake's face to run them through his hair.

Jake was immediately sickened and tried to recoil, but he had nowhere to go or the physical strength to try and get away from the man's touch.

As his fingers quickly ran through Jake's hair his arm snapped like a viper, his large fingers took hold of a fistful of Jake's hair and pulled upwards towards him.

"Listen you little faggot! I do not have the _time!_ Nor the _inclination!_ To deal with your bullshit!"

Jake could barely raise an arm, and he couldn't really make any noise but the man had pulled and was now holding Jake up out from under the covers by his hair.

Jake's eyes watered and he began to feel the pulling pain in his chest, in his scalp, in his skin…

He began to hurt, and he felt warm everywhere, but his arms were so weak that he couldn't raise them to try and do anything.

The other man looked on wide eyed, moving from his position towards his partner with concern.

Letting go of Jake he plopped back into the pillow and covers of the hospital bed and then the noise started to come out.

It was a horrible uncomfortable sound but he began crying from pain.

The cries were quiet but he couldn't maintain them because his breathing was so poor.

The other agent opened his mouth and was about to talk when his blonde superior pre-emptively turned and pointed a finger at him;

"Shut the fuck up! Let me do my fucking job, so shut the fuck _up!_ "

Jake's face was contorted in pain staring at the man in horror and helplessness.

"Now… Do you understand?" he raised his brow, "Huh?"

Jake wordlessly nodded as tears began to well in his eyes.

The man straightened his shirt and re tucked in some of the material before sitting back down.

"How many were there?"

Jake's voice cracked as he tried to recompose himself, "F-four… I, I don't know…"

The man began shaking his knee up and down as he nodded, "Were they together? Was it a group?"

"Three w-were in…" Jake breathed in sharply, "A group…"

The man nodded, "And the fourth?"

Jake shook, "I want my dad…"

"The fourth was alone? Correct?"

Jake closed his eyes and the tears fell, "Y-yeah…"

"What else!"

Shuddering Jake moved his head to the side, looking past Agent Sherbrook towards the other man, his eyes were pleading.

Sherbrook however leant forwards and slapped Jake while raising his voice "Look at me you little faggot!"

Jake's eyes fluttered from the hit and he shook in pain, surprise, and fear.

The beeping from his heartrate monitor was now flashing red.

At the same time the other agent exclaimed; "Jesus Christ… David! What the fuck!"

Sherbrook turned back around to his partner, wordlessly telling him off with his eyes.

Helplessly the other agent threw his hands up and furrowed his brow as he rubbed his forehead with one hand.

Jake's breathing was as fast as his body was able to do at the moment.

Struggling to speak all he managed to get out "I want… I…"

Then his eyes closed and his body went limp.

The man leant closer to Jake and took hold of the neck of his gown. His eyes filled with rage as he stared back at the now unconscious young man.

"Goddamn it!"

The other agent now stepped forwards and put his hands on the shoulder of his superior and pulled him away from Jake.

"David, what the fuck are you doing!?"

Outside the room yelling and a commotion of movement could be heard, and it built until the agents both turned to see the door get pushed open forcefully.

Walter and two orderlies entered through the doorway, at first Walter stopped in apprehension seeing his son's bruised, sick face, and overall weak appearance for the first time.

Then he saw that his unconscious son was being held up out of the bed by the collar of his gown by some deranged looking well-dressed man.

The other agent took his hands off his superior and was about to pull out his badge but Walter quickly jumped into the room and leapt with his fist raised towards the blonde Agent Sherbrook.

The orderlies flew into the room after Walter.

Colliding with Sherbrook's face Walter punched and pushed him away from his son's bed.

Taking hold of his shirt he grabbed and turned to throw Sherbrook towards the doorway.

Walter was attempting to position himself in-between these men and his son.

One of the orderlies took hold of the other agent and brought him out of the room while the other helped Walter throw Sherbrook through the doorway.

Speaking in Spanish to the hospital orderlies Walter yelled; "Keep these bastards away from my son!"

After the agents were taken out of the room, two nurses immediately rushed in to tend to Jake.

Walter looked at his son briefly before reluctantly leaving the room.

When he got outside he could see that the three agents were each being held with their arms behind their backs by three orderlies.

Each was protesting their current status.

Walter looked at each one and then his eyes rested on Sherbrook.

"What the fuck were you doing to my kid?"

"You call off these Spanish hounds or I swear they'll be finding pieces of you in eight different time zones."

Walter curled his lip in disgust at the threat and looked towards the fourth orderly, "Throw them to the curb."

The leader of the agents then changed tone, "Whoa whoa! Okay! Walter! Tell them to stop!"

Walter immediately looked at the man, furrowing his brow in surprise. As he did the orderly carrying Agent Sherbrook stopped.

"How do you know my name?"

Sherbrook scoffed, "I know a lot about you… and more about your kid in there."

Walter seethed as he stared at the man.

Reluctantly he finally looked to the orderly, "Let him go…"

Standing freely Agent Sherbrook shook out his arms and twitched.

"David Sherbrook," he extended his hand, "Pleased to meet your acquaintance."

Walter coldly stared at the man.

He smiled, "Fair enough." and pulled back his hand.

"Let my men go shall we?"

Walter looked at the orderlies and they each reluctantly let the men go.

"I'll admit perhaps I was… Hasty? But I hope you can appreciate the sensitivity of the situation."

Sherbrook flashed a fake smile, "Hell of a right hook you've got there Walt…"

Walter quietly blinked, "I want you to leave."

Agent Sherbrook nodded, as he rubbed his cheek, "Yeah… I bet you do…"

"But before that I've got my job to do." He paused and got closer to Walter, "I hope a fellow professional like your self can understand?"

Walter looked Sherbrook over as he responded, "I couldn't give a damn about you doing your job or not, you touch my son again, and I'll put you in the ground."

Sherbrook nervously looked to the ground as his tongue wet the corners of his mouth.

Walter continued, "And unlike your asinine threat earlier, I mean mine."

Sherbrook ignored the very real warning he was just given and continued futilely with his efforts.

"Look… You have no _idea_ what you're involved in right now!" Sherbrook's voice cracked with stress and his emotions.

Walter repeated his position, "I don't give a goddamn shit, get out of here! You want to do your job? Too bad, they're going to have to send someone else, because I will call the Ambassador and have you reassigned."

Sherbrook blinked and his right eye twitched.

"Okay… It was a long flight… We'll… pick this up tomorrow."

Walter shook his head, "I don't think so."

Nodding to the orderlies each took hold of the side of an agent's arm and Walter spoke in Spanish again, "Make sure they don't get back in here." before turning to walk into his son's room.

"We'll be back! This isn't over!" Sherbrook yelled as he was taken down the hall by a huge orderly.

Before they were taken through the ICU doors Sherbrook continued to yell, "Call Ambassador pencil-pusher! He can't do shit! This isn't over!"

Entering into the room Walter spoke to one of the nurses; "Is he okay?"

A nurse nodded, "He's okay, but it was a shock to his system. I know that this is hard sir, but please he needs to be alone now."

Walter nodded, "I know…"

Then he turned to reluctantly leave the unit.

Pulling out his phone he began to dial the extension line to the Ambassador's office.

He needed to get a full story here from someone who could actually help him.

-2-

"Is that what I fucking think it is?" A soldier announced.

Slowly six men started to enter into a large clearing.

One of the other soldiers nodded and stared with his eyes transfixed on what was lying on the ground.

Then the leader of the squad spoke "Okay ladies, keep your heads on swivels, eyes on the trees."

"They could be anywhere."

The men continued to enter the clearing in an offensive formation, spreading out and ensuring their fields of fire covered each other.

"Lee, Walker, keep eyes and rifles on that body, make sure it's neutralised, we'll cover you."

Slowly the two soldiers broke formation and walked, rifles aimed towards the eight foot lying body on the ground.

When they were close enough they say that the neck was deeply cut and that flies were buzzing around the corpse.

"Sir… He's not going anywhere." Walker said.

"Are we sure it's a he?" Lee responded, while kneeling down to inspect the corpse.

One of the other men who looked down briefly began to laugh, "Look at that cock Lee, compared to you are we sure you're a he?"

The men all laughed, the body of the male Yautja was wearing a tightly fitting cod piece, and due to the way that his armoured skirt had parted his crotch was now in full view of the military men.

"Okay, okay, shut up, keep your eyes peeled goddamn it!" The leader slung his rifle and pulled up his radio.

"I'm calling us some back up, there's no way we can haul this thing out of here."

"This is Green-Team leader; we've found a body out here. We're going to need help moving him out of here over."

The radio crackled, "This is Blue-Team, Two, we've found something as well, we require assistance as well, over."

"Control reads you Green-Team leader, and Blue-Team Two, fantastic news!"

The voice of control paused, "Okay… relay your respective positions and additional forces will be allocated to you both. How copy?"

"Green-Team Solid copy, over."

"Blue-Team solid copy, over."

Control paused, "Red-Team, how do you copy? Over"

There was a long pause as the radio remained silent. Eventually Control repeated, "Red-Team, this is Control, please respond over."

"Red-Team, how copy?"

Control inadvertently held down his transmitter longer than necessary and he could be heard in the background "…lost contact with… allocate… get them mobile…"

The radio cut out and then Control returned; "Contact lost with Red-Team. Blue-Team and Green-Team hold your positions over, reinforcements are on the way. I say again, hold positions reinforcements are en route via helicopter."

Green-Team leader nodded relieved that more men were on the way.

"If anything happens keep us updated, Control out."

Both Blue-Team and Green-Team responded; "Roger, wilco."

Meanwhile the Green-Team leader's men were poking, and investigating the corpse.

"Look at this monster…"

"What the fuck is it?"

Replacing his radio Green-Team leader pointed at his men, "Don't touch it!" His men recoiled from the body and he continued, "We're not touching it; we're not moving it until we get more guys out here. Understood?"

They all quietly agreed.

-3-

As the three agents were escorted out of the hospital Sherbrook couldn't help but shake.

"David, what the fuck happened in there?!"

Sherbrook looked at his partner, "That little shit knows…"

"He's a fucking kid! And is lucky to be alive, you go and man handle him like that? We're going to lose our jobs you fucking, psycho…"

Sherbrook ran his hands across his head as he groaned, "Gah! Goddamn it…"

"Look I know alright! I know… The fucking flight… this heat, I hate this shit."

The third agent felt his phone buzz and he pulled it out of his jacket pocket, looking at the caller he immediately handed the phone to Sherbrook.

"It's our scout leader."

Eagerly Sherbrook took the phone and held it to his ear, "Go ahead!"

The voice on the other end crackled, "We've found and secured two bodies out here…"

Sherbrook's eyes widened, "T-two…?"

The voice confirmed, "Yes sir, we have secured two bodies. And sir? They aren't natives."

Sherbrook could scarcely contain his glee, "Get them loaded up and back to the OB ASAP!"

The voice responded, "Will do sir."

And then he hung up the phone.

"Looks like we'll be keeping our jobs a little longer, gentlemen… Let's get back to the operations base…"

Turning to his junior partner Sherbrook issued an order, "Williams get the car and bring it around!"

Complying quickly Agent Williams darted down the sidewalk towards their grey-silver sedan.

"Everett, get on the phone, call uh… Damn it, call… Whoever it is out of the embassy, I want to issue a transfer of custody and move that kid into a facility we can have access to him at all times."

Agent Everett nodded and pulled his phone back out from his pocket.

"Then I want you to get back into the hospital, call down some of local guys, cops, and get a fake warrant… But I don't care how you do it, secure the blade from the post-op people, with any luck they haven't sent it to the local police yet."

Everett looked at his boss and furrowed his brow, "I'm not coming with you back to the OB?"

Sherbrook shook his head, "No no… You're staying here to deal with the hospital, deal with local PD, smash and grab if necessary, and burn any copies, I want the original reports; toxicology, neural activity, and the admittance file for this kid."

Everett started dialing and held the phone to his ear while continuing to nod.

"Squeeze whoever you have to, and remember any problems we have immediate difference 'in-field'."

"What about the family?" Everett asked hesitantly.

Sherbrook waved to Williams as the car came closer to their position.

"When we grab the kid we'll do it at night."

Everett heard the dial tone stop as his call was being answered; Sherbrook opened the door of the grey car and quickly entered, "We've got a much larger taskforce this time. So we can allocate enough men to deal with any bullshit."

Sherbrook closed the door and Everett nodded to him through the glass as he began to speak through his phone.

The car began to take off but Williams slammed on the breaks, rolling the window down Sherbrook then pointed to Everett, "And get my fucking jacket!"

Returning back to his seat in the sedan Sherbrook tapped Williams' shoulder and roared, "Step on it!"

-4-


	4. Chapter 4

(Disclaimer, this chapter has graphic descriptions of violence and visceral content)

AEAY II – Chapter Four

By her count Tawaya had seen and evaded three, six-man teams.

They were each heavily outfitted, sweeping the area and carefully moving in uniform patterns with each other.

These men were not the same as before, but she knew why they were here, and more importantly she knew what they were looking for.

Yautja

They were far more attentive than the others.

Their eyes scanned the top of the trees, and a few times they even fired at perceived movement through the branches.

They knew that she was using the trees.

Keeping her distance and carefully moving she was able to stay out of their view.

While she was moving she eventually stopped to watch one of the teams.

They had found the broken corpse of the first of the bad-bloods she'd fought.

Tawaya then clicked her tusks in pride; she did kill one of them on her own!

He must have bled out and been unable to reach his comrade or ship for aid.

'I want his head…' she thought to herself as she hung from a thick branch above.

Nodding Tawaya repeated her thought, 'Yes… I want my trophy… His weapons, his corpse… They're mine, and mine alone.'

The soldiers were looking over his body, poking it and talking loudly. Then a few of the men tried to move the dead Yautja.

They could barely lift it.

She could feel disgust rising in her throat, 'what did those humans intend to do with the body?'

Then she began to think as 'a matter of course'…

'They wish to butcher him and cut him open… See how we work…'

Clicking her tusks again she snorted, 'I would love to help open him up, if only to hang him with his own guts…'

Leaning her head back to look down the ridge of her mask at the men she continued the thought, 'But I could never give these humans the satisfaction…'

Watching the soldiers with interest Tawaya pulled herself slowly, and carefully on top of the branch she hung from.

Now sitting she zoomed in her visor's view to get a better sight of the men.

They appeared to be wrapping the body in something.

Moving the heavy corpse onto a large sheet-like material they then rolled it around until the body could no longer be seen and it was totally enveloped by the dark light canceling material.

After grunting loudly one of the men spoke, "Clip the body bag up… casevac will be here soon boys…"

Tawaya didn't understand what that meant but she knew that if she waited she'd be able to see how they were intending to move the body out of here.

Hunkering down Tawaya lowly growled and clicked her mandibles.

-1-

It seemed like ages, but when waiting for their prey to move Yautja were able to maintain a very great deal of patience.

Eventually the men stood from their sitting positions. Something very loud was coming in the sky.

Tawaya looked upwards through the canopy as a helicopter began to descend closer and closer to the treetops.

The soldiers waved their arms at the craft and the pilot skilfully moved the massive vehicle until it was hovering perfectly over the clearing and the Yautja corpse below.

Wires began to descend from the belly section of the helicopter and attached to these wires was a large flat, board-like, apparatus.

When it got close enough for the men on the ground to grab it they pulled it down lower until it was finally lying on the leafy ground of the jungle floor.

Surrounding the body, all the men stooped to roll the large Yautja corpse onto the board and they began wrapping thick straps across the hulking mass of the male's body.

When they finished each member of the squad began to carefully climb up one of the cables into the aircraft.

Tawaya squinted as she watched them. Tracking on the ground was easy… But the air was a different story. Though that's where technology came in. Tawaya brought up her wrist computer and began to activate a small tracking beacon.

After the beacon sent her back a positive connection she took the small device out of a pouch on her belt.

Actually attaching it to the ship would be another question…

She looked at the vessel. It was far too high for her to jump from a tree and attach it by hand, and she couldn't guarantee a solid attachment if she just threw it.

The men were getting closer to the top of their cables and one was already beginning to enter the side of the vessel.

'What to do…' she muttered as she thought.

Her eyes traced the cables back down to the Yautja body and its hanging stretcher. She nodded to herself and began to descend from her perch.

The wake caused in the air by the helicopter's rotors ensured that her movement in the foliage would be masked and with all the movement around them the humans were not going to be able to see the shimmer caused by her cloak.

Running through the underbrush lowly she held out the small round device and got within a few feet of the dead Yautja.

As she did the cables began to move and the helicopter started its ascent.

'No!' She growled.

Leaping the last few feet forwards she extended her hand and lodged the device in between the body and the board underneath.

He side was still hurting and the sudden movement was less than pleasing. But Tawaya was certain that she had gotten the beacon underneath the corpse enough that the Yautja's dead weight would keep it from falling out and off during the flight.

Looking down to her wrist computer she confirmed that the beacon was still sending a signal and it was slowly moving away from her.

The helicopter continued to rise and once its cargo was clear of the trees it began to fly off. 'Towards their city…' Tawaya assumed.

She knew the geography of the island well, but not intimately.

However she was confident that she knew enough to be able to find her way towards the large human settlement.

Tawaya snarled loudly 'It would be a far walk…'

'Though I've got to do something about these humans…' Growling and rumbling lowly Tawaya turned back into the jungle.

'…I still have a score to settle out here.'

-2-

Following some very obvious tracks Red-Team was unwittingly walking into a trap.

One of the squad members had seen 'it'…

Each member of the three elite teams had been instructed and provided with sketches and composite images from both the '1987 incident', and security camera stills from the '1997 incident'.

The reality that they knew what they were looking at spurred them on to try their best and engage this extra-terrestrial.

While they had an edge; they knew what they were looking for, they still didn't 'understand it'.

They were going too fast.

Following these tracks of the remaining bad-blood the leader of Red-Team had no idea what was about to happen to him and his men, nor did he really know _exactly_ what he was following.

The last bad-blood watched eagerly from his perch as the soldiers entered into view.

The tracks that he had laid were towards a small rocky hill, very close to his own ship. Inviting humans to be this close to one's ship, and by extension a hunter's only way off the planet was a bold move, some hunters would say that it was a stupid move.

But in the bad-blood's inner monologue he had explained to his shattered psyche that it was going to be; 'easier to store the trophies this way'. And he nodded as he agreed with himself.

But the main reason why he wanted to slaughter these men, in addition to his natural sadism, was his wounded pride…

Though he was a bad-blood, he had still been insulted by the fact that he'd been bested by not only a female… but her pet as well… She'd gotten the upper hand on him and even drew his blood.

He had come very, very close, to being killed and decapitated and he was not at all pleased with it.

Those two had also killed his 'brothers' as well…

But when compared to the insult done to his person, he didn't care as much for his deceased companions…

Being a bad-blood often meant that a Yautja was a little unhinged… Shall we say? And, as a result, he no longer shared the same values or beliefs that Yautja or even regular humans may have towards their fellow members.

Because of this, the last bad-blood became more enraged at the fact his neck was cut by Tawaya, then the fact that his hunting companions were both now dead.

As he thought about his greater opponent, Tawaya, he shook with pleasure as he relished the opportunity to have killed her young human.

Her cry was like a joyous hymn to his ears.

He knew that by killing her pet he had bought himself time, time enough to regroup, kill some humans, and then? Track her down and string her up.

The bad-blood cooed, and he rolled his shoulders in expectation.

She was a fit Yautja he had to admit.

One voice in his head demanded he instead take his time with her, digit by digit.

Another suggested that he quickly claim her head and get off this rock for the nearest bad-blood haven; to drown his senses in carnal pleasures and wine.

A third proposed he stalk her and make a pet out of her; so as to create a permanent 'living' trophy.

So many thoughts went through his sick and evil mind that he could scarcely contain his glee at the possibilities he could enjoy.

But the situation at hand returned his attention forwards, and into the present.

Silencing the many voices within he assured his 'selves' that there would be ample time to decide Tawaya's fate, after he'd introduced himself to these humans.

Flicking open his wrist computer he pressed a button and watched gleefully as his remote mines activated near where the soldiers were walking.

"Bouncing Betties?!" A soldier screamed.

In the split seconds between the sudden vertical appearance of the mines and their detonation, some of the soldiers tried dodging while a few were so surprised and taken back that they couldn't react in time.

Then they exploded…

Unlike a human shrapnel-mine, a Yautja's was much worse…

The flechettes in the cylindrical mines were made of a very hardened alien metal, and when the mine 'exploded' it actually just targeted the nearest living organism and shot or launched its projectiles towards the unfortunate creature.

The small blade covered flechettes were essentially like a shotgun slug… but… covered in razor blades.

The shooting up of the mines and their detonations caused clouds of dust and leaves to shoot up into the air around the men.

This dust was then changed from the colour brown to red very quickly.

The Yautja bad-blood had laid eight mines, and there were six men.

Three of the six were killed outright, and instantly by the flechettes.

One of the men, coincidentally the leader of the squad, received the worst of the initial attack.

Three of the mines had locked on to him as their primary target, and the intersecting flight paths of the projectiles, coupled with their angles of entry had rendered the man's face and body unidentifiable…

His head turned into a loose lump of material as his skull broke into many pieces, while his torso was opened in a large spray of blood and viscera, throwing his organs and muscles around the area in a wide arc. As if his body had been under internal pressure and he had suddenly been 'popped'.

The other two men had received the flechettes through their throats and their chests, piercing their hearts and major organs, opening them up and immediately killing them as well.

The fourth member of the team had dodged to the side of one of the mines and avoided being killed outright by the blades.

Instead his windpipe had been bisected by two of the blades passing him, and now he writhed on the ground, futilely trying to hold his throat together, as his arteries sprayed his blood out onto the leaves of the jungle floor.

The last two men had been hit in the abdomen.

They were not going to die from the flachette injuries quickly…

The projectiles which had hit them were lodged in their bodies, cutting and causing painful internal bleeding.

They were able to scream, but they weren't able to do anything about their current situation.

Clicking and laughing in surprise, the last Yautja bad-blood descended from his hiding place without a cloak. He looked over his handiwork with reverent glee. Like a kid who had attached fireworks to frogs he inspected the results with a terrible pleasure.

He was surprised by the mines; he hadn't expected the flechettes to work as well as they had.

He clapped his hands together as he got closer to his 'trophies'…

Though one could hardly call them such, especially the first man killed.

Clicking his tusks the bad-blood looked at the pile of gore and viscera that was once a human being and kneeled to inspect the 'corpse' closer.

Poking his thick finger nails through the red meat and blood the bad-blood shook his head and rumbled a low growl in disappointment that his mines worked _too_ well on this one.

There wasn't any skull left to speak of.

Just loose gore and broken pieces mixed in.

'Damn…' he spoke to himself.

Rising back up he turned to regard his other kills.

Four would have recoverable skulls, albeit two may or may not have holes in them.

But the last two of his targets were still alive…

His chest swelled with excitement.

Stepping over the four bodies to get closer to the two living humans he began to sway and click and chatter with glee.

The men started to go into shock, screaming from the pain, the situation, and of course: The massive, dark, masked, monstrosity coming towards them.

If they knew what was about to happen next they probably would have used the last amount of strength they had to shoot themselves.

But instead Ya-luuk…

A bad-blood branded as a murderer…

A bad-blood who was known as The Flayer of Children…

A bad-blood who had long since lost his mind, descended on them.

-3-

She heard the explosions… They were muffled, distant. But distinct, and Tawaya knew that they weren't human ordinance.

'That bastard wants me to know…' She thought. 'He wants me to come for him?'

Tawaya growled, and smacked her chest with her right hand.

'I'll come to you, you honourless wretch…'

She clicked her tusks as she leapt over a path, and a rocky indent in the jungle floor.

'I'll come… and we will finish our bout.' She growled and picked up speed as she made her way towards the noises. 'And I will bring your head to the foot of my Little Jake and wipe this stain from my honour!'

It was a very short run through the foliage before she began to hear it…

Screaming…

Horrible, mangled, screaming…

It was human and male, she could tell from her own, limited, experience.

But it was different.

It was… mindless.

Mindless screaming…

She slowed her pace, so that she wouldn't arrive to a potential fight out of breath and at a disadvantage.

But she followed the noises, until they stopped.

And an eerie calm descended onto the forest.

She now slowed her pace even farther. Through the underbrush of foliage she saw thick Yautja tracks through the dirt, and the six human tracks behind it.

'Oh no… Those human fools…'

Tawaya stopped and inspected the tracks.

'They walked right into his trap…'

Doing her best to move noiselessly and without a trace Tawaya followed the seven tracks.

Then she came upon it.

The path wound up onto an elevated area beside somewhat of a rocky outcrop.

An excellent place to place a trap…

Then she saw what the bad-blood had done.

Above the rocky area two bodies were suspended from branches overhead. They must have been the men who were screaming earlier. They had been skinned.

Flayed alive

Then, perhaps as a mercy or, which is more likely, after they had finally died of pain, shock, and blood loss, their heads had been cut off.

Blood was everywhere on the hill though.

The trees had splatter, the rocky ground was coated in sprayed blood, and there was gore all around the area.

She could see the outlines in the dirt, leaves, and underbrush where the six men had fallen and she could tell where the bad-blood had been watching.

'What kind of device had the bad-blood used?'

Tawaya began to think as she surveyed the scene before her. 'Some kind of booby-trap?'

'Mines perhaps…' She looked at a pile of bloody, tattered, clothing and what she could only assume once was a human, she continued; 'He must have made these mines on his own though…'

'I've never seen such a result before…' Tawaya shook her head in disbelief at the carnage she saw before her.

There was no smell of cordite in the air and she saw no shiny gold cylinders on the ground. None of the humans had an opportunity to even get a shot off.

Instantly her mandibles began to rise under her mask in disgust.

Not at the bloody scene before her, Tawaya was used to such a sight, she was disgusted instead at the fact that the bad-blood had so dishonourably slaughtered these humans and had decided to butcher them in such a way.

'Pure slaughter is not sport…'

She stopped herself from audibly grumbling as he thoughts continued, 'This is a rabid animal and needs to be put down…'

Giving the potentially still booby-trapped area a wide berth, Tawaya walked around the perimeter of the ambush site and uphill, in the direction that the freshest Yautja tracks had come from.

Then she heard it… over the hissing of the heat and insects, she heard the distinct clicking of a Yautja.

Her chest heaved in anticipation.

Resuming her steady stride Tawaya mounted the rocky hill and followed the sound and the tracks on the ground.

She walked and would stop occasionally, carefully looking all around before continuing.

She watched the trees, she looked for tripwires, she looked for anything and everything that stood out to her as something or somewhere she would have placed a trap.

But there was nothing.

She kept moving at this pace.

Stopping, analysing, and then continuing.

Then she finally saw it peeking through the trees; the bad-blood's ship.

She was dumbfounded.

'It wasn't cloaked, and the fools hadn't done anything to try and hide it. They merely left the ship where they had landed!'

The bad-bloods had lowered the ship down into small clearing and they either crushed or burned the surrounding foliage with their ship's exhaust to extend the size of the clearing.

'The ramp was even down!' She saw and exclaimed mentally.

Surrounding the ramp and entrance to the large craft were many stones arranged purposefully in a small cairn.

Though they were liars, though they were honourless outcasts, mentally ill murderers, they still observed Yautja ritual practise and had made an altar outside their ship…

But upon it were not the typical votive offerings a Yautja was allowed, or expected, to make.

There were skulls, organs, rotten gore, and eyes, cut Yautja dreadlocks, small stones, broken blades, handmade charms, human weapons, and a few electronic light modules taken from their ship.

The smell surrounding the place was awful; it was an acrid scent that burned Tawaya's mouth.

'But where is he…'

The clicking echoed in the distance, and reverberated off the trees surrounding the ship.

Tawaya's body tensed in uncertainty.

'Where are you, you fucker… Come on out… my blades are waiting…'

She stood, holding her breath, waiting.

Tightening her hands into fists, she looked around and made sure that she wasn't about to be attacked from behind.

Finally her impatience got the better of her, and her emotion disregarded her judgement.

She was not about to enter into this fight under a cowardly pretense.

Disengaging her cloak Tawaya strode bluntly towards the ship.

Taking deep breaths she worked up her heart rate and began growling.

Entering into the clearing she began to smack her chest and roar.

She shook her head and whipped her dreadlocks from side to side, roaring while stomping her legs as she walked.

Tawaya looked intently all around her for any sign of movement.

"Come out!" She rumbled.

She drew her blades, and waited.

She stood in the clearing and stared at the ship.

Then she slowly looked around the ring of the clearing, searching the treeline for her target.

She clicked her tusks and took a step towards the small stone cairn.

She stopped a foot or two away from it and looked down at the small holy place.

Tawaya scoffed, as if infidels such as bad-bloods could create a 'holy place'… Even the imitation of an altar or shrine by a bad-blood was desecration in her opinion.

So she had no qualms about what she was about to do.

Looking back up to scan her surroundings she raised her right foot, and without looking forcefully kicked the macabre shrine over. The blades clanged off the rock, and the slew of knickknacks and assorted 'offerings' went scattering into the dirt and flattened underbrush.

Then she heard a roar and a growl. She couldn't help but smile.

She knew that would have gotten his attention. Then he came into view.

From behind the ship the last bad-blood stomped into Tawaya's line of sight.

He'd bathed himself in red blood, and his torso was covered in it.

His helmet was also painted in the human blood.

The bad-blood once known as Ya-luuk had adorned his body in ritualistic characters along his arms, and poured blood upon his torso.

Tawaya had to admit, she had no idea what kind of practise he was doing…

She didn't want to know.

All she wanted was to take his head.

"So we see each other again?" He growled, chest heaving up in down as his breath became erratic.

She didn't want to share words with this scum. That was how she lost the upper hand last time…

That was how she lost her Jake.

She was not going to repeat that mistake. And instead Tawaya roared and hissed at him as she brandished her blades.

He returned the gesture by flexing his wrists and deploying his own blades. His chest now began to move faster and faster; as if he was going to strike…

"I want you to know" he spat. "That when I flay you I will then find your pet's body and flay him too… then I will drink from your skulls…"

Tawaya shook her head, 'don't listen… don't listen…'

"…And I will eat your flesh…"

She raised her mandibles in deep loathing.

"…I will rend your skull and bathe in your blood…"

He smacked his chest and dragged his hand across the damp blood. "I make no idle boasts…" He raised his hand and slit his palm with his blade, "I swear this all, I will do."

Holding out the open, bloody, palm towards Tawaya she recoiled and strained to keep control. She wanted to fly into a rage, she wanted to lose it and charge him, damn the potential injury. She knew that she'd be able to kill him if she did, even if he killed her too.

But she stopped herself, 'that's what he wants… think of Little Jake!'

'Think of him…'

'You have a greater duty than just your own vengeance…'

The bad-blood's body language shifted, he was surprised that she hadn't charged him, and now Ya-luuk became impatient.

'How dare her?' he thought, 'what insolence! H-how dare she!' his mind began to let loose against itself.

'Kill her… show her! Rend her…'

The voices in his head all began to talk over one another and he finally silenced them with a great roar.

Tawaya matched it and stared him down while taking a slow few steps forwards.

Suddenly Ya-luuk shook his head and sprinted.

Tawaya stopped and braced her legs, 'come on you ugly motherfucker!' she thought.

"COME ON!" She finally screamed as the bad-blood closed the distance.

She raised her blades and rolled her shoulders before the bad-blood came into striking distance.


	5. Chapter 5

AEAY II - Chapter Five

Sherbrook stood motionless, in awe of the bodies laid out on the table in front of him.

"Williams…" he spoke slowly.

"Do you have any idea what the significance of these represent?"

The younger agent shook his head as he tried to speak.

Interrupting his junior Sherbrook continued, "These two bodies represent that we are truly not alone on this rock…"

He began stepping closer to the one that still had its head.

"And that we now have finished a project started almost seventy years ago…"

Sherbrook laid his hand onto the chest of the dead body and he shuddered with excitement.

"A whole taskforce was wiped out in ninety seven by one of these things, and a special forces team in eighty seven…"

"Who knows how many other teams of ours have been killed by these bastards…"

Williams spoke up, "Or just people in general."

Sherbrook waved his hand, "oh who gives a shit Williams."

Leaning closely to stare at the dead eyes of the body Sherbrook spoke in a quiet voice, "The only people that matter are our people… You know that."

Williams raised an eyebrow.

"These fuckers killed my mentor… and for twenty years I've been scraping this program by…" His voice began to get louder as he became more animated.

"Twenty years of bowing, and saying yes, and taking shit leads, going around the world having to do stupid shit for idiot directors and Presidents, but now…"

He giggled, "Here you are… you fucker…"

"I've got you!"

There was a knock at the door and it clicked open.

Agent Everett walked in carrying a thick brown folder.

"I've done it sir!" he announced.

He stopped dead in his tracks when he saw Sherbrook overtop of the large alien body.

"Is that…"

Sherbrook nodded and smiled, yet didn't take his eyes off the dead alien under him.

"Yes it is… It's our hunter."

Leaning back up Sherbrook took a breath and sighed, "Two of them…"

Looking towards Williams and Everett he smiled, "And there are two more out there on this island!"

"Do we still need the kid then?"

Sherbrook couldn't take his eyes off of the dead bodies, and he continued to stare.

Everett looked at Williams with concern in his eyes, before speaking again.

"Sir do we still need to-"

Sherbrook held up his hand to interrupt Everret.

"Did I say at any time that your orders were belayed?"

Everett huffed, and held his dossier under his arm.

"No sir."

Sherbrook nodded and jutted out his jaw comically. His voice changed and he put on an exaggerated southern accent.

"Then I guess boy, I say I guess boy, you're still going to get that kid aren't 'ya now?"

Williams sniggered at the Foghorn Leghorn impression, but Everett had no idea what his boss was doing and it just gave him a feeling of unease.

Finally walking away from the bodies Sherbrook came beside Everett and held out his hand for the folder.

"You can have as many of the boys as you think will be necessary, but yes I still want that kid here, in our custody, under our surveillance."

Everett handed over the information packet, and nodded. Quietly he responded, "Yes sir, understood sir."

Sherbrook opened the folder and began to read the first page as he walked towards the door.

Stopping midstride he turned around again, "Everett! This is in Spanish!"

Everett furrowed his brow, "Sir they're all the original hand written reports?"

Sherbrook laughed and pointed at his subordinate, "Oh Christ, lighten up Everett, I know."

Everett relaxed slightly, and Williams looked on with a raised eyebrow.

Turning back to the door Sherbrook spoke a final time before leaving the room, "Did you get my jacket from the kid's room?"

Everett felt his heart sink. And the room somehow became quieter.

"Uh…"

Everett searched his mind as to why he couldn't have remembered or was unable to get his boss' suit jacket, but he honestly could not remember.

Before Everett responded better than his initial, involuntary 'uh' Sherbrook opened the door and walked out of the room, taking the palpable tension of the atmosphere with him.

-1-

Miles away, in the depths of the jungle the other two Yautja were currently engaged in a death match…

They had been exchanging blows, fighting, roaring, and dodging each other for what felt like hours.

Both were breathing heavily and at present stood just a few feet from each other.

Staring their opponent down the two hulking Yautja had stopped their physical battle to enter into a battle of gazes and body language.

Their displays resumed as each Yautja made their display of force, matching the other.

Tawaya growled deeper and more aggressively than Ya-luuk and he in turn flexed his impressive physique.

The two the quieted for several tense minutes, neither moved.

Each mass of muscle and death was waiting; regaining their strength and stamina as they mentally prepared themselves for the continuing fight.

Eventually Ya-luuk lunged forwards at Tawaya, making the first move of the resumed melee.

He'd hoped to catch her and use her stance against her.

If he had any style at all, Ya-luuk fought like a brawler, he preferred grapples, and ground pounding; using his opponent Yautja's weight and body against them.

But Tawaya wasn't going to be easily ensnared by his hands.

She brought up her blades and forced him to move down.

She had rolled her shoulders and moved to the side as he continued moving from the momentum of his lunge.

Before passing her though he dug his right heel into the ground and forced a pivot.

At the same time he brought his blades in a slash towards her chest.

Perversely he had hoped to not only slash her deeply, but to rend one of her breasts from her body. The idea was a sick one, but something that Ya-luuk's depravity would have enjoyed doing.

Tawaya narrowed her eyes in her mask at him and instead of moving away from him as he'd wanted; she instead pushed herself forwards and closer towards him.

Instead of slashing her chest the blades collided with her shoulder, barely making any damage.

The whole while these two heavy creatures danced they were loudly groaning, yelling, growling, roaring, and breathing.

The sound of the grunts and movement was punctuated by the loud steps of the creatures moving their weight around as they avoided strikes, made feints, and dodged each other.

Tawaya was able to score a good kick to his thigh and followed up the blow with a swipe to his belly.

The goal wasn't to actually slice him, the goal was to force him away from her; give her some room to maneuver.

Ya-luuk knew this and was forced to jump backwards complying with Tawaya's purpose.

Having bought herself a brief moment of reprieve, her left hand dropped from a defensive posture and took hold of her smart disc. As fast as she was able she threw the circular weapon towards Ya-luuk. His footing failed him as he attempted to throw himself to his right side in a dodge.

The leafy dirt floor of the jungle slipped under him and he fell gracelessly as he dodged the weapon.

Raising her blades up Tawaya pushed off the floor with her powerful calves and leapt towards Ya-luuk.

His distraction from the smart disc and his fall gave her a great advantage, and she was about to capitalise on it as much as possible.

Unable to properly retaliate Ya-luuk instead was forced to grab hold of Tawaya's blade hand with both his left and right hands.

The momentum and force she had behind the strike was stifled by his hands but she was still able to bring the blades close enough to his chest as to pierce the muscle of his left pectoral and enter his chest.

He roared in pain and Tawaya tried to push all her body weight onto him, sending the blade into his heart, but she could hear the zipping sound of her returning smart disc.

She didn't want to take her eyes off her target but she didn't want to be dismembered by her own weapon either.

Taking the briefest of glances away from Ya-luuk she could see the fast returning discus and Tawaya knew she had to break off her attack to grab it in time.

Holding her hands Ya-luuk saw the returning bladed disc and got an idea.

He switched his hands from trying to push her and her blade away, instead to continue holding her in place so she couldn't move, and therefore couldn't grab her weapon in the air.

Tawaya looked down growling in frustration and struggled as the disc audibly came closer and closer.

Freeing one hand to redraw his blades Ya-luuk wordlessly gloated before attempting to stab Tawaya in her chest.

Tawaya roared and let go of her right arm to grab his bladed hand with her left.

With all her strength she tried pulling Ya-luuk up from his awkward position to his feet as the disc zipped quickly towards her.

Ya-luuk let go of her bladed hand and pushed upwards with his head, head-butting his helmet against hers.

The two forced themselves away from each other as fast as they could as the smart disc loudly announced its return.

Ya-luuk felt the weapon pass by his head and it cleaved several of his long dreadlocks from his head.

He growled and groaned from the pain, clutching the ends of his cut 'hair' with his free hand.

Tawaya raised her left hand and caught the dangerous bladed discus.

Ya-luuk didn't wait for her to change her stance before charging her again in a football-style tackle.

The male predator had sheathed his blades and was instead bringing his fists to strike Tawaya wherever and however he could.

The impact of his shoulder to her abdomen winded her and temporarily stunned her.

Capitalising on this Ya-luuk roared loudly and brought both his fists above his head and started battering Tawaya's mask, he struck and struck, as hard as he could, bringing his fists down in a smashing motion into the hardened alien metal.

Tawaya's vision was blurred and her head was aching.

Ya-luuk had become frenzied.

Tawaya couldn't see anymore and she could barely stay conscious as each hit was followed by the next.

To an observer it was a sight akin to a silverback gorilla savaging an intruder in its territory.

Ya-luuk paused briefly as his breathing had become so shallow and quick he had run out of energy.

Blinded by her own blood running down her face and pooling into her eyes Tawaya groaned and brought her blade hand upwards, she didn't know where he was, she couldn't tell or recall anything.

But she had to do something even if it was to be futile…

She moved in a slashing motion and she felt resistance.

Ya-luuk growled and Tawaya moved her hand again, hitting him a second time.

Eventually she felt him move away from her and she brought her hands to her face.

She had to be able to see…

She removed her mask and threw it to her side.

Letting go of her smart disc she used her free hand to wipe the blood from her eyes.

As soon as she could see she looked for her opponent.

Ya-luuk had moved backwards from her clutching his side.

Her slash had opened a long gash into the lower part of his abdomen.

Bleeding heavily Ya-luuk shook his head side to side and whipped his dreadlocks before redrawing his wrist blades.

He clutched his side with his left hand tightly and began moving towards Tawaya.

Shaking herself Tawaya began to rise to her feet.

The bashing on her head had given her a loud high pitched ring in her ears, and her balance was severely impacted.

She could barely stand straight.

Dazed she moved from side to side as she struggled to stand upright as Ya-luuk came closer.

Raising her blades to block his coming strike the steel clanged awfully as their weapons clinked and scraped against each other.

Pushing one another back Ya-luuk tried again to strike.

This time Tawaya missed her opportunity to block and stumbled slightly to the side.

The angle made Ya-luuk's blade slice along her left shoulder. Growling in pain Tawaya tried to grab his arm and hold him in his position while she stabbed him in his stomach.

Stumbling again Tawaya fell to her knee but maintained her grip on Ya-luuk's arm.

He growled and roared but was unable to move his hand and jump away from her; instead as he struggled under her grip his blade cut and sliced more wounds along her shoulder.

With no other choice Ya-luuk let go of his wounded abdomen and attempted to take hold of Tawaya's blade hand one more time.

As soon as he removed the pressure from his belly though, the skin and muscle ripped and gave way as he let out a horrible scream. His legs gave out from under him as the slash Tawaya had made while blinded revealed the extent of its damage.

She had cut deeply enough that she had actually disembowelled Ya-luuk.

Tawaya watched through her bloody eyes as Ya-luuk fell to his knees clutching at his intestines now protruding through his own skin.

Tawaya let go of his blade hand as he fell and he continued to crumple, past a kneeling position Ya-luuk instead fell onto his back onto the forest floor.

Tawaya steadied herself and stood up and backwards from her opponent.

With her mask off she splayed out her mandibles in an aggressive display and roared at Ya-luuk who was groaning and screaming in agonised pain.

Stumbling a few steps as she moved Tawaya felt a bolt of nausea and she vomited to her side violently as her head continued to thunder and pulse in pain from the pounding she'd endured earlier.

Writhing on the ground Ya-luuk attempted to level his wrist at Tawaya and fire his blades at her but she felt a second wind.

Her chest heaved and she raised her arm as she threw herself and her whole weight behind her wrist.

She aimed her blades at his mask and roared as she fell onto him.

Ya-luuk screamed one last time as she brought her blades down. His voice was silenced by the puncturing sound of metal.

Her blades easily cut through the centre of the crest of his mask and deeply embedded into his skull.

His arms went limp and his body shook minutely with convulsions.

And he was quiet.

Tawaya pulled her hand up and the blades out of his mask and she brought them down again, this time through his visor.

She did this again and then triumphantly roared as loud as she could muster.

Ya-luuk was dead.

She smacked her chest with her left hand and then took hold of his throat, pressing her fingers as hard as she could she ripped through his skin and into his bloody esophagus.

She took hold of his tongue and pulled it as hard as she could.

His green blood began to pour from the open neck and she shook her hand as she growled at her trophy.

"Never shall you speak again!" She yelled to his motionless body.

"May you walk the afterlife blind and mute!"

She threw the tongue away and then got to her feet.

Taking hold of his remaining dreadlocks she held his head up and began to pull.

She could hear sickening cracking and the sound of rupturing muscle.

Sheathing her wrist blades she repositioned herself and dug both her heels into the ground.

Roaring loudly, spreading out her mandibles, and shaking her head side to side Tawaya began pulling on either side of Ya-luuk's head.

Eventually it began to give way and she could hear it ripping out of his body.

She pulled off his head and several vertebrae from the bloody green stump of his body. Tawaya began to yell and roar as she now held the decapitated head above her own.

Thick green blood trickled down onto her as she held up her hard won trophy.

She growled and roared again. And then began to breathe with relief.

The bad bloods… were dead.

With her display now finished, Tawaya felt the exhaustion get to her, and she dropped the head onto the ground before falling to her knees.

She was tired, cut, bruised, bloodied, and she felt down.

But she was not broken.

She had won.

And her chest welled with emotion, and triumph.

Her mouth burned from the bile earlier, and she could taste blood on her lips, but she had done it, and now she had a brief period of time to relax herself.

Tawaya wanted her thoughts to calm and her mind to go blank, if only for a moment, but her concerns would not let her.

She had much to do…

She had to dispose of the bad-blood's presence here.

She had to get back to her ship.

She had to track down the other bad-blood's bodies, and finally she had to, _had to_ see her Jake.

She'd earned it after this. To see her little pale human would make this day the happiest of her life so far.

Tawaya stopped herself.

Did she really just think that?

Coming to her feet she shook her head and attempted to stay level, her balance was still off from Ya-luuk's battering, but she was surprised by her own thoughts.

Though she'd have time to find her Jake, and she'd have time to deal with her thoughts and her heart later.

For now she had to deal with this bad blood ship.

It wouldn't take long, but she knew that it was going to be a pain to destroy the main piece of the Yautja presence here, but with those human soldiers combing through the jungle it would only be a matter of time before some of them happened upon the ship.

She didn't want to think about what would happen next…

Shaking off her unease she swayed side to side as she walked.

Her balance had yet to fully return but she could manage.

'Blow up the ship, take his head, find the others, dispose of them and the humans if need be. Then find Jake. Simple.' She thought.

Now to actually do it…

'The ship is easiest… then we'll work from there…'

She took a deep breath as she walked, 'One foot after the other, come on now girl… we can do this…'


	6. Chapter 6

AEAY II – Chapter Six

"Okay Mr. Jake?"

Jake shook his head as he tried to refocus, "S-sorry?"

The nurse smiled and looked down, "Did you not hear anything I said?"

Stepping back into the room, the man cleared his throat and repeated himself: "I said I'm going to be right back, Okay? I have to get a few things but I'll be back to check on you."

Jake nodded and adjusted his position in his bed slightly.

"Okay… See you soon Miguel…"

The hospital staff was very friendly, and in the brief period of time he had stuck up a pleasant rapport with the main nurse that had been checking on him.

Jake was glad he wasn't doing this on his own.

He would have chuckled if breathing didn't hurt so much, but he was glad to be alive…

Several of the nurses who had seen to him, as well as his doctor, all continued to tell him that he was lucky. Even after seeing his family they too all told him how lucky he was… How close to death he had been…

'For the second time…' he thought.

Jake shuddered and looked up at the ceiling.

His side hurt… His chest hurt…

Even his scalp still hurt from where that psycho cop pulled him…

He tentatively raised his hand to his face and rubbed the side of his jaw where the guy had hit him.

"Fucking asshole…" he mumbled lowly.

It was later in the evening now, but Jake couldn't tell what time it was.

He was groggy and his joints all felt tense, creaky like he hadn't moved in days…

'God it would be great if Tawaya gave me a massage…' he smiled.

Then he immediately felt saddened.

'Tawaya' he repeated.

'I'm never going to see her again…'

He sniffled and brushed his bangs off his brow, 'Fuck man… I'm never going to see her again am I?'

He shook his head and tried to stay positive.

In the corner of his eye through his room's window he saw some movement.

Turning his neck to get a better view Jake's eyes curiously searched into the dark hallway.

His door was open and Jake took a breath before calling out, "Miguel? Is that you?"

He heard what sounded like a commotion and a loud crash against the floor.

Then through the window he saw two men wearing almost all black. Their faces covered by balaclavas.

Jake's eyes widened and he immediately felt his heart sink.

"Oh fuck…"

The men came closer to the window and nodded to each other before pushing Jake's door open all the way.

"What the fuck!" Jake exclaimed.

"Who the fuck are you!" he called.

Neither of the men responded, and one spoke to the other, "We'll tie him up and grab him."

Jake's mouth opened and he began to stir in panic, "Help! Anybody out there! Help in here help!"

He began screaming as loud as he could but was quickly silenced by one of the men's gloved hands pressing down over his mouth.

Despite the pain, and the possibility of pulling his stitches Jake began to move and strike out, writhing and fighting as best he could.

"Get the fuck off me" he mumbled, pushing out and striking at the men as much as he could.

The man holding his hand on Jake's mouth struggled to grab one of Jake's arms as he spoke to his partner, "Jesus Christ! I thought they said he'd be sedated!"

His partner threw the covers off the bed and quickly used police style twist-ties to restrain Jake's feet together.

Gruffly the one agent responded hostilely, "Just shut up and keep him still!"

His partner, struggling against Jake's constant punches and pushes let out an exacerbated voice, "I am!"

"Fucking help me!"

Even though Jake fought as hard as he could the men eventually tied his arms together.

"Where's the tape? As soon as I move my hand he's going to start screaming."

The one agent pulled a roll of thick grey duct tape from his back pocket.

"Here I'll rip it…"

Positioning the tape above Jake's face the agent continued, "As soon as you let go of his mouth hold his head still."

"Right"

Jake breathed erratically and tried to buck his head out of the man's grip.

"One, two… Three!"

In a swift motion the one man let up his hand and held Jake's head still with an iron grip while the other brought the tape down across Jake's lips.

Jake tried to scream but these men had done this before…

They were good at it and Jake was easily muted.

He struggled against his restraints and made muffled yells.

"Okay, what end do you want?"

One of the agents laughed, "I'll take the head. That way he's not going to be giving me that death glare…"

The other agent nodded, "Okay, we'll lift him up on three."

"Got it…"

"Barry's got the elevator open for us… It's not that far a walk."

Jake looked at the two men and tried to move as much as he could; continuing to yell in a muffled protest.

The man about to lift Jake's legs held up a hand and began trying to quiet him down, "Look kid stop, stop!"

"Neither of us want to do this; but I will punch you right in your stitches understand? Okay?"

The man held his fist up and a tense second of silence passed.

"Got it?"

Jake stared the man down and wanted to defiantly struggle but at the same time… He really didn't want to get hit again…

'Okay… Jake… just… We'll get out of this…'

He nodded reluctantly.

"You're going to be quiet?" The agent asked.

Jake didn't want to give in, but… he had no choice.

He nodded again.

"Okay."

The agent looked at his partner, "On three?"

"Ready, one, two, and three…"

The two agents easily lifted Jake up and out of his bed.

"Let's go!"

Quickly the two men carried Jake like he was a cadaver.

"Elevator's that way, that way!"

The agent at Jakes feet tried pointing with his head to direct his partner.

"Okay I got it! No need to yell, I have to back up you dick."

Jake looked around as they walked down the dark hallway and he saw Miguel's unconscious body lying on the floor.

Some blood glinted on the back of his shaved head.

Seeing the concern on Jake's face the agent at his feet spoke up, "He'll be fine kid, he's not dead."

Jake spoke a muffled "Fuck you".

He made sure that the agent could hear it, but it was low enough that he wasn't about to get hit for it either.

The men rounded the corner and Jake heard the voice of a third man.

"You got him?"

"Yeah we got him, close the doors."

They entered the elevator and Jake was able to see the third man. He, like the other two, was wearing all black, gloves, and a balaclava.

"Well this was a lot easier than we thought it would be!"

The three agents laughed.

Outside the elevator and down the hall a man with a flashlight began walking towards the open doors.

"Hola?" He called, then he began speaking in Spanish loudly, his tone indicated he must have been a security guard or an orderly.

"Oh shit!" One of the agents exclaimed.

"Close the fucking doors!"

The second man began hitting the button on the elevator's panel rapidly, "I'm trying!"

The guard came around the corner and the third agent, Barry, drew his pistol.

Jake's eyes grew wide and he began mumbling in protest, the agent at Jake's feet immediately whispered, "Barry! Put that away!"

The agent at Jake's head quietly tried to keep him under control, "Shut up kid! You don't want me to hit you."

Turning the corner the guard came into view of the men and immediately raised his voice.

Barry brought up his pistol just as the doors were closing and as the other two agents were about to yell at Barry not to, he fired.

The doors of the elevator closed and the two agents involuntarily dropped Jake. All four occupants of the small elevator clutched at their ears.

The shot rang loudly in their heads, and the sound was not helped by the fact that an elevator is a small metal box…

Sound reverberates very loudly inside.

"Fuck! The kid!" The agent at Jake's feet leaned down to check him.

"You okay kid?"

The shock of hitting the ground knocked the wind out of him and Jake immediately began coughing and struggling to breathe.

His eyes fluttered and he looked around in confusion as his face became flush red.

"Shit!"

"Barry, you fucking idiot!"

"Get the tape off him; he's no good to us if he can't breathe!"

The agent at Jake's head bent down and ripped the tape off in a quick motion and Jake let out a loud horrible cough.

He struggled to take in a breath and when he finally did he began to yell.

"You fucking assholes! You fucking, mother fucking cunts!"

The one agent laughed and the other shook his head,

"Let me the fuck go!"

The agent at Jake's feet drew his side arm, and at the appearance of the weapon Jake held his tongue briefly.

"Kid, you better shut the fuck up."

"Or what? You need me alive."

Barry chuckled.

"Isn't that right? Kind of hard to threaten you'll k-kill me, if you actually need me alive…"

The agent at his feet nodded, "Yeah… But I can still shoot you in the kneecap."

Jake's face went white.

"See? That won't kill you, but… It'll hurt really bad… So shut the fuck up okay? Or the tape goes back on."

Jake pursed his lips tightly as he stared back at the agent.

"Nod if you understand me."

Jake moved his head up and down as he shook in fear.

"Good."

Turning his attention to the agent at Jake's head he continued, "Grab his arms."

They took hold of Jake again and lifted him off the ground as the elevator door dinged open.

"The car's not that far…"

Jake shut his eyes and focused on managing his breathing.

Despite being dropped by the men Jake noticed something…

His chest was hurting a lot less than it was earlier.

Even though he had been dropped and he was being aggressively handled by the two agents, Jake's stitches hadn't ripped…

He wasn't bleeding at all. Jake exhaled in disbelief, 'Fucking great drugs I must have been getting here…'

'I wonder what these assholes actually want…'

Jake furrowed his brow, 'Goddamn it… I'm so sick of this vacation…'

-1-

Tawaya was having a really rough time…

She was able to destroy the Bad Blood's ship; she had set the auto pilot to take the craft up into the atmosphere over the ocean and she timed the self-destruct to go off when it was far from any human eyes.

That was easy…

But she'd not rested since her fight.

She'd also brought Ya-luuk's body onto the ship, ensuring it'd be destroyed along with the ship, and all the Bad Blood's technology.

Dragging his dead corpse was much more tiring than she thought it was going to be.

Now leaning against a tree Tawaya was breathing heavily.

Her right hand was helping brace her weight against the tree while her left was carrying Ya-luuk's still dripping decapitated head.

'To the ship… then to track where they've taken the other bodies…'

She mumbled under her breath, "Come on… Little Jake is counting on you…"

After she was ready she pushed herself off the tree and began to trek through the jungle one more time.

She cloaked out of habit, but she was confident that there wasn't going to be anymore run-ins with the humans.

It was getting cooler in the air.

And light was beginning to falter.

Evening was coming.

Tawaya nodded confidently, she'd have a definite edge over the humans in the darkness.

In fact that'd be perfect.

If she was going to be getting close to the humans, in their city, among innocents and non-combatants then the dark was going to give her the additional cover and help she was going to need.

She patted Ya-luuk's head and chuckled to herself.

'I'll leave you on my ship, and then I can find your friends…' She clicked her tusks and continued to laugh quietly to herself.

"Fucking Bad Blood fool…" She whispered under her breath.

-2-

When the agents arrived at their sedan they threw a black bag over Jake's head and laid him across the back seat.

He protested and struggled but with three large adult men holding him still it didn't last very long.

After Jake was left in the back of the car he heard the agent begin to close the door, but he stopped mid-action. Leaning off the steel door Jake listened to the strange conversation that proceeded.

"Okay" the lead agent said.

"You and I will drive the kid back to Sherbrook." He paused and exhaled a small chuckle, "Barry you take your car and stop by a McDonalds or something and get everybody something to eat."

The other agent laughed while Barry voiced his protest.

"Are you serious? Right now? And that'll take me forever to wait for that much food!"

The other agent was laughing and trying to hold it back while the lead continued to talk,

"Yeah? Well maybe you'll have time to think about why firing your sidearm in fucking elevator is a stupid idea then."

Barry grumbled and held his tongue.

"Good…"

Jake heard the lead agent lean towards the car, "Hey kid you want anything?"

The second agent continued to laugh loudly, and even Barry stifled a small chuckle.

"Happy meal… Nuggets… a small burger?"

Though his head was covered and he couldn't move Jake responded with as much venom as he could muster, "Fuck you!"

The two agents continued to laugh at the ridiculous situation. "Guess he doesn't want anything."

The door slammed shut but Jake could still hear muffled talking.

After a few seconds the driver's door and the front passenger's opened and the two agents quickly sat down.

The one agent sighed as he adjusted in his seat while the other turned the key in the ignition.

As the engine came to life Jake felt the car begin to move.

After about a minute of quiet one of the agents, the one sitting in the passenger seat, spoke.

His voice revealed him to be the lead agent,

"Well, I'm surprised you're staying as quiet as you are kid."

Jake pursed his lips and shuffled around slightly. His chest hurt and he could feel the surgical incision on his chest itching… It was weird but the more time he spent out of his bed the more he was beginning to realise that he didn't feel that much in pain.

At first he didn't really listen to the agent but eventually he thought about a response.

In his head Jake snorted at himself, despite the situation and how much danger he might have been in.

Nothing was as scary as when he faced that pissed off Yautja… Or the one he literally helped kill…

A newfound confidence began to swell in Jake's chest.

His fear started to melt away. It was no longer as powerful as when he was first abducted.

In his mind he heard Tawaya's voice encourage him, 'Tell them off Little Jake… They have no idea what they're messing with.'

Under the bag on his head he smiled as he finally gave the agents his response, "Blow me…"

The driving agent choked on his own breath in surprise as he began laughing.

The lead agent however was quiet.

"What was that kid?" He shuffled around in his seat, "You know I'm really starting to dislike this attitude."

"Huh, that's weird; you sound just like my step-mother."

The other agent made a loud "oh!" sound.

"You think this is funny? Keep your eyes on the road."

Jake heard the lead agent smack his partner and turn around in his seat.

"You want a hole in your knee kid?"

Jake began to act on auto-pilot as the words began to come out of his mouth.

He was surprised at his own voice… It didn't sound like himself, and he certainly did not feel like he used to.

"Let me tell you something, my dad is calling and getting down to whoever the fuck you people are. And you can be sure you'll be out of a job or worse if he finds out you guys hurt or mistreated me."

The air in the car changed and both agents became quiet.

"Though as bad as my dad can be?" Jake laughed under his breath. "What if my friend finds out you guys hurt me?"

The agents didn't say anything but Jake could tell they were both tense. After a few seconds one of the men spoke; "You're in contact with one of them?"

The lead agent's voice was deadly serious but Jake could tell he was hiding something behind his words.

"Maybe I am, maybe I'm not."

Jake adjusted his arms, "Do you want to risk it?"

The driving agent laughed nervously, "Jesus Christ, who's this kid think he is? It's like a Chihuahua yapping at a Pitbull!"

"Well I assume you douchebags want me to talk about the things I've seen right?"

Jake cleared his throat and tried to sit up.

"That asshole cop guy yesterday who hit me? That's where you're taking me right?"

There was no response.

"Well I'll tell you about them!"

The one agent tried to interrupt, "Lay back down kid; don't make us pull over"

"Fuck you dude, I've seen them in person, I watched one of them throw a fucking SWAT guy into a wall while cutting another in half!"

"The one I know?"

Jake paused… He didn't want them to know that it was… well a female.

Changing his words he continued, "He's a big fucking animal and can snap your neck with one hand."

The agent's voice became agitated, "Okay you little shit, how the fuck did you meet with them, and spend so much time around them? Hmm? How the hell are you still alive?"

Jake thought for a moment before he blurted out, "They like steak…"

The agents both laughed uncomfortably. The driver nervously exclaimed, "What the fuck!"

"So you what… bribed them with meat?"

Jake immediately thought about the word as a euphemism, and the memory of Tawaya licking his dick made him giggle involuntarily… 'Stay focused Jake!' His thoughts yelled. 'Stay serious.'

"Something like that…" he responded.

Smiling quietly to himself at the private joke he adjusted his position again, still trying to find a comfortable position.

"What a crock of shit!" the lead agent exclaimed.

Immediately Jake became defensive, "Oh yeah? Then why the fuck am I in the back of your car?"

"You explain to me why your psycho boss seems to have a…" He paused, his voice cracked as he tried to find the right words.

"…a hard on for me!"

The car became silent again.

Nearly a minute of quiet passed before one of the agents spoke, "So you're saying that the one…"

He cringed as he continued to speak, "the one fucking alien… we'll just call it what it is… the one alien is your…"

He rubbed his chin, "Is what? Your friend?"

Jake moved around and finally came to a sitting position.

"Yeah something like that."

The agent driving spoke up in disbelief, "Bullshit."

"You what… have conversations?" The lead agent's voice sounded sarcastic.

"Yes we do."

The agents quietly looked at each other and scoffed.

"I can see why Sherbrook wants this kid! He's as crazy as him!"

The agent laughed and moved in his seat, "So you expect me to believe that you have had conversations, IE plural, meaning more than one."

He paused, "With a fucking nearly seven foot tall alien life form?"

Jake huffed and kept up his confident voice, "You know what agent-guy I don't fucking care what you believe, all I know is that as soon as I talk with my seven foot tall alien _friend_ I'm going to tell them how you have all treated me."

Jake nodded to himself. He continued to feel better.

It was strange but he was feeling… powerful?

Is that right? Like… he might have been bound, and he may have been taken by these mysterious people. But…

The more he thought about Tawaya, the more he considered escape and seeing her again, the better he felt.

'Is this really mind over matter?' he thought, 'It can't possibly be the medication I was on from the hospital…'

"So how would you contact your friend? You got their number?" He laughed, "Do they have Facebook?"

The agent driving scoffed.

Jake thought, 'what would be the best response?'

Then he smiled to himself. 'Oh I've got it…' he cleared his throat and tried not to sound anything other than serious.

Jake couldn't help but feel like it was a line from a movie or something…

"They'll find me…"

The two agents were silent.

"The first time I thought it was a mistake, or a coincidence." Jake began, "The second time… really odd."

He laughed, "But the third time? They had climbed into my hotel room, up the side of the building and through the balcony door."

The car was completely silent except for the sound of the road and wind outside.

"I assure you my friend will find me."

Jake's chest tightened with excitement and anticipation at the thought of seeing Tawaya again.

"And when they do? I have pretty good feeling it's not going to go well for you guys…"

The agents were still quiet.

A full minute of silence passed and Jake's words came out involuntarily; his voice was sarcastic and he felt like, in a small way, he was in charge of the situation.

"What's wrong boys?" he asked.

There was no response.

"Not going to tell me to shut up?"

Jake smiled under his head covering.

A sadistic thought crept into his mind; 'I hope Tawaya gets them all…'

-3-

Sherbrook sipped a coffee as he sat on top of a table.

"How's it going doc?" He asked in between satisfied drinks of his warm beverage.

A suited up doctor was currently performing an autopsy on one of the two massive Yautja bodies.

"These creatures are incredible…" the woman said in awe.

"The musculature is unlike anything I've seen!"

Sherbrook nodded and got closer to the surgical table.

"They are magnificent aren't they?" he quietly asked.

The doctor pointed at the skin of the Yautja's open chest and poked it with her finger.

"Look at how thick the epidermal layer is? This whole section is scar tissue!"

Sherbrook furrowed his brow, "And?"

The doctor rolled her eyes.

"The amount of skin lost and damage that this creature had taken in that one injury would have left a human dead from either blood loss or shock."

Sherbrook nodded and took another sip, "Yeah, we've also got footage of one shrugging off nine millimetre bullets like they were BBs."

He finished his drink and sighed, "I want to know how they work doc…"

She nodded and went back to her work.

Sherbrook's phone buzzed and he stepped away from the table.

Looking at the screen he saw that it was Agent Everett's number.

"Keep up the good work doc."

Unclicking the device he held it up to his ear and spoke.

"Agent Sherbrook, how can I help you?"

The voice on the other side was indeed Everett, but he sounded shaken, or unsure.

"Sir… are you sure we need to grab the kid?"

Sherbrook huffed, "Are you at the hospital?"

Everett stuttered, "Yes… well…"

"What is it Everett? Are you there or not?"

"We already grabbed him…"

Sherbrook let out a breath of satisfaction, "Excellent…"

"But sir is this really a good idea? Like… There's still two of them out there."

Sherbrook shook his head, "Everett I've worked too long and too hard on this to let it go now."

He began walking out of the small room and his voice climbed, "I need to talk with that little shit one on one. Now how close are you?"

Everett quietly mumbled and there was some interference on the line before he responded.

"We just passed the canal park."

Sherbrook couldn't contain his excitement, "Excellent! You're what another ten minutes or so?"

Everett mumbled again to the driver and then responded, "Yeah, give or take, there's almost no traffic."

Sherbrook nodded, "Don't speed! The last thing I need is you getting pulled over and the locals get involved."

"Got it Sir,"

Sherbrook exhaled again, "Oh Everett, everybody on this op is getting a commendation and a raise when we're done." He laughed, "I guarantee it…"

"Right…"

Everett's voice didn't seem at all enthusiastic; money and a possible promotion were the farthest things from his mind right now.

-4-

"Just keep driving…" Everett's voice sounded plain and disappointed.

Returning his phone to his pocket he removed the balaclava from his head and rubbed his face.

Behind him the kid spoke back up.

"Didn't sound like your boss picked up on your concern Everett…"

Immediately Everett's thoughts began responding, 'If this kid doesn't shut up I swear…'

He turned around to face their now sitting captive.

"Kid, just shut the fuck up okay?"

"You know what? I imagine that you guys are going to be really fucked up when they get there."

The driver looked at Everett and furrowed his brow.

'Look, I don't care what you think is going to happen but Sherbrook wants to talk to you, and then you'll be let go. So this whole…"

He let out a shallow, fake, laugh, "Act? It's pretty stupid and you can drop it anytime."

Jake shook his head from side to side slowly.

"I wouldn't be so sure of that…"

The driver tapped Everett on the arm, "Just ignore him. Turn on the radio, we're almost there."

The rest of the ride Jake held his tongue, quietly hoping that Tawaya was actually going to show up…

He really didn't have a plan to get out of this otherwise…

Under the covering on his head he could slightly see his arms, moving his wrists he noticed that the bonds weren't as tight as they should have been.

He held his excitement in check as his mind began to race.

'I think I've got an idea…'


	7. Chapter 7

AEAY II – Chapter Seven

When the car finally came to a stop Jake had been able to twist and loosen the restraints around his wrists to the point that he was fairly sure he could fit his right hand out.

But he didn't try it before he'd gotten his bearings.

After the car stopped the agent driving turned the key and removed it from the ignition, shutting the engine off.

Jake's heartbeat began to loudly thump in the back of his head.

His throat felt dry and he swallowed automatically. The hair on his neck stood on end as he listened, still unable to see.

The two agents both unlocked their doors and made noises as they exited the car. Standing on either side of the vehicle they began to talk and their voices were muffled just enough that Jake couldn't hear what they were saying.

As soon as the two doors closed and a few seconds passed without the men then opening the doors to back seat to pull their 'captive' out Jake began to move; he first brought his hands up and pushed off the black mask.

And at first he didn't really notice a difference, it was dark, almost pitch black outside. But there was light coming from the nearby road. Streetlights flickered and gave off orange light in the otherwise desolate night.

And after a few blinks Jake had adjusted to the environment he now found himself in. In the back of his mind he confirmed; 'We're far from the hotel that's for sure…'

Turning in his seat Jake looked out either side of the car at the two agents.

He stole looks at both Everett and the other man enough to burn their faces into his mind.

Then his heart began to beat faster and faster.

'Now I need to get out of here…'

He looked down at his legs. He hadn't any foot wear and his ankles were tightly bound together by the plastic shit around his wrists.

Unlike his wrists however it had no looseness to it and was instead clicked all the way to its tightest.

'Now or never' he confirmed.

Pulling his wrists apart and twisting he'd loosened the one side enough that he could finally squeeze his right hand out.

It scrapped his skin and he strained and fought to push it through; groaning under his breath as he pulled as hard as he could. "Come…. On… you…"

With a final scrape across the back of his hand and the uncomfortable pressing of his finger bones together the hand came free.

Jake's eyes shot open in surprise and he giggled shallowly in excitement, "Oh my god… it worked!"

'Now what you idiot? You can't run anywhere!'

Immediately Jake leaned over to his ankles and tried pulling at the restraints.

Outside the men began to move. 'Fuck… out of time…'

"No… no, no!" he whispered under his breath.

'Do I put my hand back in? Do I fake it? Come on!' he felt sweat on the back of his neck and his hair fell uncomfortably from his brow into his eyes.

'Now's not the time fringe!' Wiping the hair out of his vision he hadn't any idea as to what to do next and panic welled in his chest.

'I'm not going easy with these fuckers…'

Everett was distracted and he stood in front of the right side back door.

"It's now or never Jake!" He repeated to himself.

A surge of confidence flowed into his bloodstream as he went for the right side door handle and opened it.

He pushed the door just enough that it was off the lock-latch and then he brought his bound feet upwards.

Quickly positioning himself he kicked the door with both feet with all his strength.

Before Agent Everett even saw the movement he was smacked by the door and he tripped backwards on his own feet clumsily.

Jake yelled involuntarily at his success "Ha, ha!"

The other agent opened his side door and proceeded to lunge at Jake.

"Fuck you!" The boy yelled as he threw himself through the right side door.

Everett was on the ground clutching at his chest in pain as Jake tried standing on his bound legs.

'Fuck… what are you going to do Jake? Hop to safety?!'

Shaking his head to dissipate the inner monologue Jake took as deep a breath as he could.

Now out of the car Jake began screaming.

"Help me!" He began, but quickly he corrected himself and began yelling "Fire!" he took a breath and continued repeating himself; " _Fire_!"

He had remembered from online, or a movie or something that yelling fire actually had a better response than any other request for help.

Whether or not it was true didn't really matter and Jake was willing to try anything.

He was hopping as best he could across the rough and wet asphalt, screaming; "Fire! Please!"

Down the street in the darkness he swore he could have seen a figure. But the streets near the small building they were in front of were relatively run down…

They were in a seedy area if Jake had ever seen one, and the scary unfamiliarity of the city streets was made worse by the fact it was night.

By now the other agent had rounded the car and was within two strides of Jake.

"Please!" He screamed, " _Por favor_!"

Shaking his head he tried to use the Spanish he knew, " _Por favour, f-fuego_!"

" _Fue_ -"

His word was cut off as the other agent placed his large hand over Jake's mouth.

Jake struggled against the man's grip and bit into a large chunk of his palm. He spat and drooled saliva as he continued to dig his teeth into the man's skin.

He began to yell and with his other hand he tried to choke Jake into letting go.

Everett was now getting to his feet and pointed, "W-what the fuck? Shut him up!"

Finally Jake's teeth began to draw blood and the man moved his hand off the boy's face. Spitting and continuing to scream Jake tried to struggle against the agent's grip.

Behind the three creating the commotion the door to the building opened and Agent Sherbrook stepped out into the cool tropical night.

He looked at the display before him and he shook his head, "What the FUCK are you idiots doing? We can hear his screaming clear as day inside!"

He walked over and when he was behind Jake he took a hold of a handful of his hair.

"Now, you grab him like this, and just pull!"

In time with his words he pulled backwards and Jake winced and cried out loudly. Pulling, Sherbrook caused Jake to fall onto his ass.

Since he was wearing a medical gown the shock of the asphalt didn't have anything to block its immediate contact with Jake's skin. And the cold wet ground soaked the thin garment and slickly rubbed against Jake's exposed buttock and naked legs.

Dragging Jake by his hair Sherbrook took charge and led the two other agents back into the building.

Jake didn't even try to hide the fact he had gotten his right hand out of his restraint. He just fought against Sherbrook's grip and was trying his best to alleviate some of the physical pulling on his scalp.

But from his current position it was appearing more and more futile.

When they finally entered into the building Sherbrook let go of Jake's hair. Looking at his fingers in disgust he wiped some of the black threads he had pulled out of Jakes head onto his pant leg before finally addressing his incompetent agents.

"Stand him up and get him into a chair."

He snarled as he looked down at the curled Jake moaning on the floor in pain and clutching at his head.

Looking back at Everett Sherbrook pointed a finger and narrowed his eyes, "I will deal with _you_ later."

Everett nodded and as soon as Sherbrook turned around he and his partner leaned down on either side of their target.

Jake had stopped his wailing and instead was numbly drifting and mumbling.

'That… really, _really_ , fucking hurt.' His thoughts confirmed.

His head was throbbing so much so that it seemed audible, and the dragging across the pavement scrapped the shit out of the back of his naked legs, and even his ass cheeks. His skin underneath him burned and he winced as the two agents helped him back up to his feet.

Jake was doing what he could not to focus on the pain…

"Come on kid…"

'N-no fighting back just yet Jake…' he thought, 'just wait a little bit…'

He felt like he was floating and as the men directed him down the hall he stopped momentarily.

"Come on! Don't try any-" Loudly interrupting Everett Jake vomited.

His bile was tinged with red and Jake shook his head from side to side as he winced, punctuating the action with a breathless voice; "That… that tasted like blood…"

He leaned into the side of Everett and the two agents looked down at the small pool of reddish brown liquid before looking back at their charge.

"Holy fuck…" One of the men exclaimed.

Sherbrook poked his head back into the hall and had a look of surprise and disgust, "What the hell just happened?"

Everett shook his head, "Sir… We didn't… I…" He looked Jake over before continuing, "I don't think this is the right call sir…"

Jake's previous strength and encouragement all began to fall away and he swayed uneasily, barely staying upright. He leaned against Everett and the other agent for support and his weight began to pull him down.

For the first time Sherbrook's face seemed to agree with Everett.

"Just… Maybe sit him down in there."

Sherbrook pointed to one of the rooms to the side and the two agents nodded.

Entering the small office room Everett turned on the light and led Jake towards a chair against the wall.

When the agents helped lower the kid into the seat they looked at each other seriously.

They exchanged a wordless conversation and Jake leaned back.

He felt like shit…

He was in pain…

And he totally did not like having just thrown up.

But he was not nearly as bad as it looked.

The men's faces were uneasy and they slowly walked away from Jake, eyeing the young man with serious concern as they exited the room.

But Jake did everything he could to play it up.

He swayed like he was drunk, and he let every wave of pain come across his face so as to make the performance genuine… He even let drool come out the corner of his mouth.

But the hardest part was trying not to smile.

It had worked… _Correction_ it was working…

The two men walked out of the room and hastily began to talk to each other, and then Jake heard the third voice of Sherbrook.

He didn't have enough time or enough energy to waste trying to listen to the men so instead he began to try and continue his escape.

'Okay… now look around! What can you use?'

Jake's eyes darted wildly around as he took stock of what was close, and what all was in the room.

His mind was racing, and despite his sudden bout of nausea, which came from having been forced to stand up so quickly… Jake did not nearly feel as bad as he probably looked.

'Now… how can I get these fuckers?'

-1-

Tawaya's mask was green with low-light intensifier setting.

She'd been making her way, slowly, towards the beeping tracking device.

In the corner of her mask's read out was a three dimensional echo-based map of the area with a flashing and pinging location illuminated in a light blue.

Tawaya shook her head in gratitude; the tracker was leading her towards a sparsely populated area.

'Excellent' she thought, 'Gods be praised…'

Cursory scans indicated very few active life forms and she felt confidence begin to rise in her chest.

She'd been using the roofs of buildings to run across, only jumping between ones that were close together.

She was far too tired, and far too injured to risk doing long jumps.

Despite never having done track and field nor did she ever attend a high school phys-ed program Tawaya's performance in jumping over large distances, hurdles, or similar objects was decidedly lacking.

She could scale buildings no problem, she could run cross-country for days if need be… But wind-sprints, finesse-based obstacle avoidance, and quick reactionary movements were difficult for her to perform consistently.

The downside to having as much pure musculature and brute strength as a Yautja was that you tired easily doing one thing after another.

"I'm going to eat… so much meat after this…"

Tawaya nodded to herself.

She lifted herself arm over arm up the side of a building's metal external fire escape.

"I'm going to drink until I fall into a black-sleep. I'm going to eat a whole Ta-ta-tua and I'm going to sleep…"

Jake flashed across her mind.

She groaned and twitched, "Yes… yes… and Jake."

Her chest became heavy but she threw it off.

"There'll be time enough to worry when I'm done this." She repeated. "I will see you soon…"

When she finally made it to the roof of the run down project apartment building she stopped and gathered herself.

Breathing deeply she leaned forwards and placed her hands on her thighs.

Lowering her centre of gravity she steadied and fought to stay focused.

The new elevation wasn't helping her headache and she was really feeling her torn muscles and sutured wounds.

It was like a dozen flies circling her face in a hot afternoon… She wanted to swat them but it'd make her more uncomfortable and tired and hot if she did.

Slowly leaning back up she took a few steps across the dry tar roof to the edge of its other side.

The location that the tracker was indicating was a small storage building nestled between an overgrown vacant lot and what appeared to have been at one time a small market.

Tawaya had watched humans and been to their settlements enough that she was able to recognise many things, their uses, and so on.

Though of course she didn't really know their names she felt this was inconsequential… It wasn't like she'd ever need to ask 'where do I get some groceries?' she mentally chuckled, or 'can you help me get a replacement coupler for my ship's engine?'

She clicked her tusks at the absurdity of the scenario before kneeling to focus on the building below.

Clearing her mind of anything but the task at hand she quickly fell into her hunter mode.

Flipping through her vision modes she was able to see through some areas of the building.

It was distorted and it only really worked on the thinnest parts of the building's walls but she was able to see a little bit of what she'd be dealing with.

The building had what looked like several small rooms connected to a hallway on the left side of the overall structure, while on the right side of the hallway there was a single large room.

'That's where they'd have the bodies…'

She moved to her right angling her head so as to see around objects in the building distorting her line of sight.

It took a few moments of visually going back and forth side to side, but eventually she saw it.

Combining her vision modes she confirmed the bio-signature of what she had spotted; A Yautja's foot was in plain view just a small distance away from the still active tracker.

She clicked her tusks in a small triumph.

It had worked… she'd found where they'd taken them.

'Now' she thought, 'How many of these rats do I have to take care of?'

Switching her view again she saw a few humans moving around the building, but she couldn't get a good view of anything… Since they were moving the distortion and the distance she was at didn't allow her mask to produce a good picture.

The fact that her head and mask had been bashed by Ya-luuk didn't help either…

'I think I'll have to get closer.'

She grumbled as she grabbed the ledge in front of her. But thankfully the building wasn't that many stories.

'Let's go…' she whispered and began her final climb of the day.

-2-

"Look Sherbrook…" Everett paused and rubbed his chin, "This kid is looking grim as shit…"

Sherbrook was in the larger room of the building looking over the Yautja cadavers while Everett stood in the doorway.

Everett's voice quavered, "I don't want him to like… internally bleed or…" he sighed, "look I just don't want to be responsible for killing a kid."

Sherbrook finally looked up and spoke, "Doctor…"

The woman on the other side of the room adjusted her glasses.

"Mhm." She mumbled.

"Go with Everett and see if this kid is going to make it."

She nodded and stood up from where she was leaning against the wall.

"I need him to talk." Sherbrook added.

Everett nodded silently in appreciation at the gesture his boss was making, and he offered a worried smile to the woman.

She raised her lip and curled in annoyance.

"Which room is he in?"

Passing Everett she entered the hallway and was greeted by Everett's partner and Agent Williams were using paper towels and a mop they had found to clean Jake's pool of vomit.

They looked up and nodded awkwardly as she huffed in disgust.

"That's from the subject?"

Everett furrowed his brow, "The kid? Yeah… it's from him."

The doctor shook her head, "Yes… the kid."

"Force of habit… usually people vomiting near me and those I inspect are subjects… not."

She paused, her voice rising oddly, "not referred to as _people_."

Punctuating the sentence with a toothy grin Everett nodded quickly and started for Jake's room.

-3-

"Okay Jake… come on…" whispering constant encouragements to himself Jake had worked up enough confidence to move. And while he'd been alone the young man got up from his chair and looked around the cluttered office for anything useful.

Hopping from where he was he made it up and to the other side of the small room.

The room he was in, and Jake mentally wagered the rest of the building too, hadn't been used regularly in ages.

He could see that dust coated many of the objects in the room, and the furniture had all been moved against the walls with boxes and random items thrown on top of them. Some of the boxes seemed ordered and placed purposefully, but then there were several random items that looked like they had just been thrown into the room and forgotten about…

Everything indicated that the primary purpose of this office was now for storage.

'It wasn't meant to house a prisoner…' Jake thought.

He smiled and his hope grew, whispering under his breath he vocalised his thoughts, "Which means! Tools… and escape…"

Hopping towards the desk pressed against the wall opposite the door Jake got within arm's reach to begin searching for anything to help him.

On the desk there were three office boxes, presumably with files, or papers in them. But just underneath these boxes were still all the assorted items of a person's work desk.

Despite not being used in a long time the desk hadn't been cleaned off of its previous purpose and Jake could see a day planner, pens and pencils, stationary, and business cards strewn across the surface under the brown office boxes.

Then like a small sliver of grey he saw what he'd secretly been hoping to find… a knife.

Moving the boxes just enough to reach underneath them Jake took hold of the small weapon and realised what it actually was.

He was disappointed but his thoughts didn't skip a beat, 'Okay… it's not a knife. But a letter opener will still do the trick!'

The metal was embossed with a corporate logo and Spanish script, but Jake didn't devote any time to reading it.

He lowered himself to a crouch and immediately slid the blunt and dull 'blade' in between his ankles. When enough of the metal was in he began to pull up against the plastic of the twist-tie.

"Come… on…" he whispered.

As he pulled and angled the tool between his feet, the plastic restraints dug into his skin deeply. It started to hurt like hell but he swore he could feel the plastic giving.

"Come on!" he whispered again.

The prospect of just getting this off his legs meant he could walk... If he could walk properly then he might be able to run.

He was worried about having _just literally being abducted from a hospital_ but if he could run to safety… anywhere away from these people… then he'd be able to live long enough to get help…

Outside in the hall he could hear talking and the sound of a wet mop.

He paused momentarily before allowing himself a small giggle; he immediately knew what they were doing and he mentally continued to laugh.

'They're cleaning up my puke…' Despite the stress of the situation he smiled at the small victory. 'Fuckers…'

Turnign his full attention back to his bonds he kept pulling and letting up, pulling and letting up. Each round of force hurt his skin and his hands more, but he had to be making progress… 'Right?' he asked himself nervously.

As he took a break from his last big pull he heard footsteps getting closer to the offices' door.

"No… are you fucking kidding me?!" he whispered as he looked over his shoulder at the plain press-board door.

With desperation he put his left hand on top of his right and took a sharp breath before pulling with all his strength.

The plastic cut his skin and some blood began to seep up through the scrapes but finally the restraints twisted and deformed enough that he could get it off his feet.

His apprehension and fear at whoever was about to enter the room stopped him from enjoying the success of freeing his legs and at the same time as his feet came free the door to his room opened and Jake turned while quickly standing back up.

Adjusting his grip on the letter opener and Jake wasn't really thinking coherently anymore. Instead animal fright totally took over, and Jake's faculties emulated what they thought was going to be his best form of defence.

Everett's face was shocked and dropped in surprise when he saw that Jake was not only out of the chair where he'd left him but was standing up and unrestrained.

Reaching for his holster and sidearm Everett drew his weapon and the man's training took over.

"Put the knife down!" He loudly ordered.

Behind him in the hall the two other agents looked up and dropped what they were doing.

Drawing their weapons they all came up behind Everett.

Everett put his left hand on the doctor's shoulder and pulled her backwards and then pushed her towards the other agents.

While not an agent the doctor knew enough to comply and she quickly got out of the way.

Acting on their training Williams and the other agent then pushed and directed the doctor to move back into the other room as Sherbrook quietly entered the hallway.

Jake's chest heaved up and down rapidly as his heart beat faster and faster.

He hadn't really planned for this…

Everett stood tensely as he steadied his pistol. "Look kid just put the knife down okay?"

"I really don't want to do this!" He declared.

Jake nodded and his lips shook, "Y-yeah…" he agreed.

"Kid… we can work this out alright? Just put the weapon down…" his voice relaxed in tone and he tried his best to give off a calming volume.

"We can talk… we'll get you looked at."

Everett looked Jake up and down quickly and noticed that his legs were standing widely apart, there were red rings and spots of blood around the young man's ankles and Everett pointed downwards.

"Look kid you're bleeding. We can get you patched up and we can even give you some clothes…"

Everett nervously laughed and saw in the corner of his eye Sherbrook and the other agents form up against the outside wall of the office.

Each had drawn their weapon and they tensely watched Everett.

They were nodding approval at his voice so far. Everett took a step back as Jake moved from foot to foot.

"Come on. We've got a doctor. She was going to take a look at you but now you might have scared her off okay?"

Everett lowered his aim ever so slightly as he tried to play on Jake's potential fear of injury. "Look you were just in the hospital, right? I didn't want to take you out of there."

His voice attempted to portray him as Jake's ally.

"Right? I didn't think you were ready yet, so… She needs to make sure you're okay, right?"

Jake nodded. He played along for now…

But Jake's thoughts were racing; 'what the fuck are you going to do now Jake?'

Outside the building there was the noise of a car approaching.

Everett tensely kept his gaze on Jake but he couldn't help but look out the corner of his eye towards the entrance to the building.

"That's Barry!" one of the agents whispered.

Jake heard the voice and took his eyes off of Everett.

Everett then looked to his immediate right and turned his head, "Shut the fuck up!" He whispered back.

"Keep looking at me! Keep your eyes on me kid okay?"

Outside Barry did indeed arrive and he was carrying several large bags of greasy, fast food, which he'd picked up from the first generic restaurant location he'd seen since he left the hospital.

As in slow motion Sherbrook moved backwards as Everett turned from his right side to his left, surprised at the sound of the opening door at the end of the hall.

Barry's red face came into view and before he could see the situation inside or announce his arrival, above the hallway, a large explosion rang and blew the roof tiles down.

Jake as well as everyone outside the room reacted by lowering themselves and involuntarily looking up at the same time as debris scattered and rained down from the roof of the hallway.

With Everett's gun no longer on Jake he dove to the side of the room and made himself as low to the ground as he could.

The explosion was punctuated with a familiar and ear-ringing-ly loud roar.

Then the men's voice turned into a chorus of yells over top of one another.

Jake stayed low and stared down the open doorway.

From where he was Jake could no longer see out of the room and instead was angled just enough to see Agent Barry frozen at the end of the hall clutching his packages and yelling at the top of his lungs.

A huge rumbling thump sounded in the hallway and was immediately followed by a chorus of firearms.

Involuntarily Jake dropped his letter opener and clutched at his ears. The ringing from the explosion was loud, but the screaming and gunfire made it even worse.

Shutting his eyes and pressing his hands tightly to his ears he shook nervously at the muffled booming of the shooting.

'Was that…' he thought.

A genuine smile erupted across his face and his eyebrows rose in disbelief, 'no… that was…'

The soft round features flashed in his mind as he mentally said her name. Excitement and fear were now filling his chest in equal measure.

'That was _her_ …'


	8. Chapter 8

AEAY II – Chapter Eight

Tawaya was hoping that she didn't have to do any more gods damn climbing. But here she was, climbing the side of another fucking building…

She mumbled under her breath and clicked her tusks in annoyance.

Her arms were sore and she hated this shit…

But she had a plan.

And hopefully it would work without a hitch.

'Think about meat… sizzling… bubbling up in a… in a greasy sauce.' She shivered and clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth.

"Oh sweetness… I can just see it…"

She remained silent but allowed herself a mute breathless chuckle.

"I'm going to lie down in the sun. Eat… drink…" she clicked her tusks "and that little human is going to rub me until his little hands come off."

She smiled under her mask.

Tawaya could just hear her little Jake complaining now. She was looking forward to hearing that voice…

-1-

"So… Tawaya? Do you like this?"

Jake ran his fingers along her legs as the odd couple sat in the shade on their private beach.

She cooed and looked upwards as his small fingers tried to massage her skin and tight calf muscles.

The female Yautja nodded.

"Keep at it Little Jake."

The young human smiled and giggled involuntarily.

He squeezed his hands around her left leg and lowered his mouth towards her skin.

Furrowing her brow Tawaya eyed him with suspicion.

"What are you…"

He pressed his lips against her and kissed a small line up towards her knee.

The taste of the salt water made Jake finish the action by licking his lips and wiping his mouth.

He looked up at Tawaya and she couldn't help but enjoy the strange practise.

His pink lips were so soft to the touch.

She growled and leaned forward.

Jake playfully stuck out his tongue and she eyed him sensually.

His voice became low and he began to put on a comical expression.

"Tawaya's so serious…"

He giggled again and leaned forwards to press his lips against her right leg but she moved her hand towards his face.

Jake stopped mid action as she poked his lips with her finger.

He stayed still and looked at her, his eyes watching hers as she traced one of her long nails along the edge of his lip. Expectantly he waited and he cooed as she clicked her black nail against one of his lip rings.

He parted his lips and slowly opened his mouth for her as she leaned closer towards him.

"What is this called?" she asked.

Bringing her hand away from Jake's face she pointed to her leg where he had been kissing.

She moved her hand up and down as she pointed.

Jake smirked and he couldn't help but enjoy the small bit of innocence Tawaya seemed to have.

"It's called kissing."

Tawaya watching him intensely before leaning back, and relaxing, Kessing…"

Jake shook his head and laughed.

"Ka, ii sing… Kissing." he corrected.

Tawaya nodded.

"If I were to let you…" she raised her right leg up and indicated he was to hold it.

Jake took hold of her calf and began rubbing it with his thumbs softly.

"… Keep _kissing_ where would that, soft, mouth of yours end up?"

Jake smiled and his cheeks quickly grew red.

"well…" he giggled and rubbed his nose, "I don't know…"

He brought his lips towards her skin and kissed her again.

He laughed, and cringed at what he just thought of to say.

Taking a breath he kissed her again and then looked up, "I have a habit of getting lost…"

He tried to keep a straight face but immediately laughed and Tawaya couldn't help but click her tusks in amusement at the quip.

"Then just focus on the rubbing for now Little Jake."

Jake nodded but quickly snuck an extra kiss against the skin just below her knee.

"Got it." He said before pressing his thumbs against her, this time with a little more force than before.

Tawaya looked out over the water and sighed with satisfaction at the feeling.

"Could I get dressed maybe?"

Tawaya chuckled and looked him over.

"Ask again when you're done."

Jake raised an eyebrow, "Wait… what?"

She clicked her tusks and rumbled with a low laugh.

"You heard me Little Jake… Now keep going."

She cooed and purred.

-2-

When Tawaya finally reached the roof she nodded and paced around.

'Maybe this time around he'll be able to massage a little bit better.'

The back of her mind growled, 'Do you think he'll be in any condition to do that Tawaya? You fool…'

Shaking her head she looked at the roof below her feet and switched her vision mode.

Inside there were several humans grouped together, Tawaya could tell they were adult males, but what caught her attention was something that she hadn't counted on.

In a room away from the adult humans, was a smaller bio-signature.

'It couldn't be…'

She shook her head.

But below her the voices of the humans were getting louder.

'Jake?'

The same men who'd taken the bodies had captured her human…

'No… it makes sense…' she brought her hands to her sides as she knelt to a crouch.

'There must have been the same men I saw… they… the…'

Then she heard his voice.

It was muffled and the audio was distorted but she could tell that it was her Jake… He only said one word but she knew…

"I'm coming Jake…"

She stood back up and searched her belt.

"I'm coming Little Jake!"

Pulling a remote mine off her equipment belt she armed the device.

Under her breath she whispered while kneeling, "I'm coming."

She had adjusted the yield and the blast was going to be enough to get her in, but not take out the whole roof. When it was armed and ready she stood back up.

Stepping back from the explosive Tawaya took a deep breath.

"I'm coming right in on top of you, you…" she remembered a word Jake had used multiple times before. She clicked her tusks as the foreign human work formed in her mouth, "…fuckers."

Pressing the detonate button on her wrist gauntlet's screen she immediately overrode her instincts and leapt towards the fireball erupting in front of her.

Punctuating the action with a roar she descended through the hole the blast created and into the building below.

The familiar frightened voices of humans greeted her and she forgot all about her body's pain and its many injuries.

"What the fuck is that!"

"Get down!"

"It's the last one!"

The humans all began to yell and scream different things, and Tawaya drew her wrist blades.

"Shoot it! Shoot it!"

The humans started firing off their weapons and Tawaya skilfully dodged forwards while slashing at the man closest to her.

"Time to kill!" she growled in her native tongue.

To the humans they heard a terrifying growled sentence and venomous alien words.

-3-

Everett turned and jumped out of the way as Tawaya thundered down through the roof while Sherbrook stepped back from his men in frozen apprehension.

Agent Williams tried firing at Tawaya and in response was the first man to be attacked.

The uncoordinated movement of the men and their respective reactions to the sudden appearance of their quarry produced a chaotic flurry of motion.

Williams was closest to Tawaya and had his pistol leveled at her as soon as he saw the vaguely humanoid shape appear. Seeing the massive shining blades it was armed with made Williams empty his magazine as fast as he could.

The shots passed by Tawaya or embedded themselves into her chunks of armour she was wearing; a few pinged and ricochet off her helmet, lodging into the drywall.

Tawaya's wrist blades stabbed into William's chest cavity and she used her left arm to help raise his body in the air.

Sherbrook and agent Valdez raised their weapons and began firing. They tried aiming at the Yautja as best they could but on the other side of the hallway were Everett, Barry, and the doctor.

Several of their shots hit Williams while others soared past the creature and smashed the glass of the door behind Barry.

Finally snapping out of his stupor Barry dropped the food to his side and hit the deck. Simultaneously drawing his pistol.

Tawaya blocked Sherbrook and Valdez' view of her with Williams' corpse and as soon as they stopped shooting and she had a stable hold on it she responded by throwing Williams.

Valdez pushed himself to the side of the hallway but Sherbrook wasn't fast enough and Williams' body collided with him loudly.

Collapsing under the awkward projectile Sherbrook dropped his pistol and became pinned by his former subordinate.

Valdez yelled over the growling and screaming of Sherbrook. "Everett! Shoot it! Shoot it!"

Tawaya shook her head side to side and roared as loud as she could muster before looking to her side.

Everett stumbled along the wall as he tried to get distance between him and the alien.

Raising his pistol he tried aiming for centre of mass and as he pulled his trigger Tawaya easily lunged forwards and took hold of his throat.

Barry was hyperventilating and screaming nervously on the ground as his hands violently shook.

Valdez raised his pistol again and pulled the trigger.

His weapon clicked harmlessly and he ejected the empty magazine.

His hands shook as he ran them along his belt.

Reaching his holster he took hold of his second magazine and loaded it as fast as he could.

Everett struggled under Tawaya's grip and she roared again. Easily she squeezed her hand and broke Everett's throat.

Throwing Everett's body down the hall after Williams', Valdez tried firing his pistol.

Everett's body collided with Valdez and he stumbled backwards as he semi-caught Everett.

Tawaya sprinted after the body and drove her fist and her wrist blades through Everett's corpse and into Valdez.

Screaming Valdez tried to move his hand so that he'd be able to shoot the alien.

Pulling the blades out of Everett Tawaya placed a hand on Everett's shoulder and moved him off of Valdez.

The action twisted Valdez' shooting hand awkwardly between Everett's side and the corner of the wall, and as Everett fell away from in between them Agent Valdez came face to face, or rather face to mask, with an adult Yautja.

Shaking with rage Tawaya raised her right hand and drove her blades into Valdez' chest just below his throat, the metal cut through his muscles and broke his collar bone as it pierced through his lungs and heart.

When Valdez exhaled a sputtering last breath Tawaya stepped away and let him fall down the wall.

She rolled her shoulders and turned around. At the other end of the hall she saw two more humans; one on the floor cowering in fear, and another against the wall to her left, frozen and as still as a statue.

Barry still held his pistol but was now violently shaking as he lay on the ground.

To his right the female doctor's knees were bent slightly but had pushed her body against the wall as much as she could. Her hands were place against the wall with her fingers spread out, like she was going to be invisible if she made herself as thin as possible.

The Yautja let out a huff, finally breathing after her quick combination of attacks.

These two bore no threat to her at the moment.

Taking a step forwards Barry's finger slipped and he fired a single shot.

It flew past Tawaya and into the panelled roof of the hallway.

She growled and hastily took several steps towards the fat human cowering on the ground.

Barry began raising his voice in an involuntary scream as she got close. He started pulling his trigger again and again as she got closer. A few shots did actually hit her, but nine millimetre rounds were not nearly enough to critically wound a Yautja.

Barry's shots were actually the most accurate out of all the agents' and he scored several direct hits. One bullet hit her left arm, another went through the right side of her abdomen, and a third grazed her neck.

When she was within range Tawaya brought her foot upwards and it collided with Barry's hands.

The hit knocked the pistol out of his hands and actually broke several fingers in his left hand.

He tried to scoot backwards as he continued screaming.

Growling and letting out a small roar Tawaya leaned down and grabbed Barry by the back of his neck and shirt.

Easily she brought him upwards and she lifted him to his feet.

The sound of material ripping punctuated the action and she quickly let go of the shirt. With a swift action she brought her hand around and took hold of his neck.

Simultaneously she choked and lifted Barry off the ground.

His screaming stopped and was now muted. He gagged and continued to struggle under her grip.

Bringing her right hand up Tawaya was intent on gutting him open from groin to neck.

But she stopped.

"Tawaya?" a voice called out.

Barry's eyes were staring at the blades and he continued to kick and struggle without breath.

The Yautja turned her head to see over her shoulder and let go of Barry's neck.

The agent fell to the ground clutching at his throat and coughing loudly.

Tawaya looked down the hall and saw a small figure in a strange single piece of clothing.

"Tawaya, it's me…"

The Yautja felt her heart jump in her chest and she immediately began running towards the figure.

She clicked her tusks and choked on her words but finally exclaimed in English; "Little Jake?"

-4-

His Yautja thundered down the warzone of a hallway and Jake couldn't help but quiver with excitement.

"T-Tawaya!" he finally exclaimed.

He took a few barefoot strides before the two came together.

Tawaya lowered herself and extended her arms widely to either side of Jake and he in turn moved his arms upwards.

Without saying a word to each other and without having any additional communication Jake leapt upwards and towards Tawaya.

The Yautja in turn caught her human and brought him tightly towards her.

"Little Jake!" she growled.

Her large hands and arms wrapped themselves around his back and held him tightly.

Jake didn't even realise it but he had wrapped his legs around her abdomen and he had buried his face into her neck.

The boy's thoughts raced; 'I've got to smell her…'

The pressing of her body against his and the hands on his back made everything else fall away.

The world ceased to exist for a few seconds.

Jake couldn't feel anything except for what was going on inside his chest and her body against his.

She purred and cooed and made clicking noises as she ran one of her hands up and down his back rapidly.

It was as if she was inspecting him…

She couldn't believe he was here, she couldn't believe he was in one piece.

Her Little Jake was alive.

Right here,

In her arms…

"Little Jake…" she repeated, almost in disbelief.

He laughed and mutely giggled into her neck.

His arms were wrapped around her neck and he clung to her as close as he could.

But eventually his arms gave out and without any awkwardness Tawaya and Jake both knew to let go of the other. As if in a synchronised motion the two let go of one another, Jake descended back to the floor and Tawaya rose back up to her full height.

Jake then looked down at his body where he all of a sudden felt wet.

His arms and legs had bright green liquid smeared on them and he regarded it at first with confusion and then he looked up at Tawaya to see that where ever on him had green corresponded to a wound on her body.

"Tawaya! You're hurt!" he exclaimed.

She shook her head, "No… no, I'm not."

Raising her right hand she brought it close to Jake and touched the side of his jaw with it.

"I'm not…" she repeated.

Jake nodded and his eyes filled with an earnest expression of happiness.

His brow relaxed and he nodded with understanding.

"Don't f-fucking m-move!" They heard Barry yell.

Tawaya whipped back around to face the agent but she shielded Jake with her body. She kept her left hand on Jake's chest and she tensed her right while she brought it up to a fighting position.

As soon as she saw Barry Tawaya began a low rumbling growl in her chest.

"K-kid. You… you can talk with that thing?"

Jake tried to poke his head to the side of Tawaya to see around her as he responded.

"Yes, I can talk with her."

"H-her?" Barry spat out, in confusion.

"W-well tell her I d-dd-didn't do, f-f-fuck all!"

Tawaya lowered herself and Jake could tell she was readying her legs to move.

Touching her arm with both his hands Jake tried pulling her to turn back around and look at him.

"Tawaya, stop! You're not going to kill him are you?"

The young human's voice distracted her and she looked to her side.

"Tawaya?"

Barry was shaking and he held his pistol with his right hand, he seethed with pain and he leaned against the door behind him.

"Little Jake…" she responded.

Jake looked down the hall at Barry and at the doctor whose mouth was open in terrified interest.

Jake's heart beat loudly in his chest and he looked at Barry sadistically.

A strange sensation came over Jake.

He had an unbelievable power right now, and it dawned on him; he could get Tawaya to do anything…

A battle began in Jake's chest and his eyes looked up and down his Tawaya.

Her body was cut, bloody, and she shivered with strain.

He looked at her weapons, and his thoughts continued, 'she brought almost all her stuff to get me…'

Her wrists both had their gauntlets and her fists had blood on them. In fact she had red blood splattered across her chest and arms.

Looking back at his gown he saw that in addition to her bright green blood the bloody of Williams, Everett, and Valdez must have been on him as well.

'These fuckers… these fuckers who kidnapped me…'

He took a breath, 'these fuckers who… who took me in this fucking hospital gown… who hit me… who had me so fucking scared I nearly pissed myself…'

Jake shook his head.

'They had me so scared I was convinced I was going to die here in this… secret agent bullshit...'

'That fucking c-cunt Sherbrook who…' Jake's mind shot through with his fear driven thoughts, 'They would have like dissolved my body in acid and lied to my family…'

'These fuckers who… they were going to kill me… they lied. They all lied!'

Jake felt a strange desire come up the back of his neck.

A desire that his mind was telling him he was entirely justified in feeling.

'Most people want to get back at the people who fucked them… who hurt them…'

He remembered the strange feeling of satisfaction when he heard Williams, and Everett… and the third man who'd abducted him… he felt… glad.

Yeah…

Jake felt good that he heard them die…

He shook with a strange realisation.

He didn't actually feel guilty.

Jake remembered back to when he helped Tawaya kill the other Yautja… how he had felt physically sick…

Then Jake thought about how he'd felt since he woke up from the hospital; strange… kind of off… He thought he'd felt this way because of the drugs or something but, now in Tawaya's presence and with the choice he had in front of him.

He knew what he wanted to do…

He could… actually feel it in his skin, in his breath, and in the back of his head.

His heart pounded loudly and he could feel it throughout his extremities.

Then he finally spoke.

And for the first time in his life Jake felt powerful. It was the kind of power that transcended money, and the ability to pay a waiter or hotel person to do him a favour.

Jake's mind started to race… It was the kind of power that he imagined Tawaya felt…

He remembered how helpless and scared and how much of a bitch he must have looked like when he ran away from the Yautja in the hotel.

The one that wanted to get him and his sister…

He had thought at the time that if he could distract the Yautja he could have saved her from it… But he still knew that it was essentially sacrificing himself… It wasn't necessarily a powerful choice or a powerful way to deal with the situation.

He wasn't able to do anything else and so he still felt helpless.

But now?

Jake finally decided.

'I want to feel _power…_ '

Clearing his throat he looked up at Tawaya and began to speak while pointing at Barry.

"He helped tie me up…"

Jake held his wrists up for Tawaya to see. She lowered herself and her left hand immediately grabbed and held Jake's right arm up closer to her face.

"They hit me Tawaya."

Tawaya looked Jake up and down slowly, and then she began to hiss.

As Jake continued talking, the truth became embellished by his fears and what he had thought was going to have happened, "They abducted me and were going to torture me until I told them about you…"

As soon as he said 'torture me' Tawaya whipped her head back to look at Barry. Her chest was heaving up and down in short rage filled breaths.

Behind them Sherbrook groaned as he struggled to move Williams' body off of him. The noise made Jake look down the messier side of the hallway.

When Sherbrook was clear he huffed and breathed loudly. Jake then pointed at him as his voice became low and tinged with disgust,

"Especially him… he hit me… and threatened me… and wanted to get you."

Tawaya looked away from Barry, down the bloody and messy hall at the four bodies on the ground.

Sherbrook's face became visible amongst the carnage and as soon as he saw Tawaya standing unobstructed his eyes widened and he froze in awe again.

Tawaya slowly looked away from second man and back to Jake.

Wordlessly Jake stared back into her expressionless mask.

Sherbrook coughed and raised his voice, "K-kid… look I know I might have been a bit… rough with you… but… look." He groaned and pushed himself up from the ground. "L-look…"

Tawaya turned and roared loudly at Sherbrook's movement making him instantly hold his breath.

Raising his empty hands up he stuttered and shook, "Look, y-you've just been an accessory t-to this moment… We don't need any-"

Jake's lip curled in a sneer and he interrupted Sherbrook. "You were never going to leave me alone…"

Sherbrook's brow furrowed and he looked up, "What?"

"You and all this bullshit was going to continue even if you let me go."

Jake looked away from Sherbrook and back at his Yautja.

"Tawaya… what will you do?"

She stood motionless.

Her mask gave away none of her intentions and her body remained still except for her quick breaths.

Jake cleared his throat and touched her right arm with his free hand.

"Would you do it for me?"

She nodded, letting go of her human's wrist, and stood back from Jake.

Stomping down the hallway towards Sherbrook the man began to stutter and yell as she got closer and closer.

Jake looked away and towards Barry and the doctor on the other end of the hall.

Jake bared his teeth and smiled, his shoulders shook and he exhaled loudly.

Tawaya roared and Sherbrook cried out in protest, there was loud shuffling of movement and then the man went silent.

Barry quietly watched in wide-eyed horror at what Tawaya was doing behind Jake to Sherbrook.

And the doctor finally made a noise and simply began yelling.

Jake took a step forwards. But he noticed that it really stung and hurt.

Looking down he saw that his feet were bloodied and cut from the debris blown down by the explosion; rather uncharacteristically Jake simply mumbled "Ow…"

Behind him he heard Tawaya walking back up beside him.

Her chest heaved and her hands were covered in red blood.

Barry raised his pistol, "I'll shoot the kid!"

Tawaya stopped mid stride and began to growl.

Jake smirked and he looked at Tawaya with excited eyes, then he looked back down at Barry.

"It understands E-English right?" Barry yelled.

Jake nodded wordlessly.

"Then it'll understand that if it takes another step I'll fucking blow the kids head off!"

Tawaya hissed and growled very loudly.

"Is that a particularly wise thing to be saying Barry?" Jake scoffed.

"Shut the fuck up!" he snapped. "If it understands me then it can respond!"

Jake looked at Tawaya, an eyebrow raised.

Despite the seriousness of the situation Jake didn't really seem all that phased by it…

In fact, the young man had entered into a bit of a trance like state sine the arrival of his alien companion Tawaya.

Jake was curious as to how she'd sound if she actually chose to speak to another human.

Thinking about what was to happen Jake watched her closely for several tense seconds before Tawaya finally spoke, in English, to Agent Barry.

"What… do you… want?" her voice was low. Each syllable echoed slowly down the hall.

When she actually spoke Barry stumbled and shook and the female doctor dropped to her knees mute and in complete terror.

Barry's lip quivered and he held his injured hand close to his chest as he looked around the hallway.

His voice came out stuttering and anxious, "W-well I wanna fucking live! T-that I think is fucking, fuckin, obvious?"

Tawaya stared him down and then looked at Jake.

She stepped to the side, shielding Jake again.

"Look… I l-leave, nothing happens… I don't even know your name kid. I don't have the files I don't have the reports… I didn't see s-shit."

The doctor looked away from Tawaya and Jake and directly at Barry.

"What are you doing!" she cried.

Barry looked away from the alien and at the doctor, "Fuck you! I don't want to die here!"

Looking back Barry's voice changed, he seemed kind of anxious and was thinking aloud; "She knows! Look you want to get rid of everything Right? The doc here is the one that wanted to cut you open!"

The doctor's face dropped, "You fucking fat idiot!"

"Take the bitch! I don't know fucking anything! Let me go out this door and you'll not worry about any of this shit. I don't even know the number for the rest of the task force! She does though!" he pointed at the doctor with his pistol.

"Don't you think she's innocent, she's worse than Sherbrook!"

"As soon as she can she'll contact all those weird special forces guys! Look I'm literally not a field agent."

Barry choked and continued his verbal defense, "L-look I was shifted around and I'm supposed to just b-be the CIA attaché in the E-embassy."

Tawaya stood motionless and Jake poked his head around her arm, "I really don't think she cares."

Barry's face twitched.

Tawaya rolled her shoulders and relaxed.

Jake tapped her shoulder and without turning her head off Barry she bent her knees. Lowering herself Jake stood against her back and got close to the side of her head.

He spoke quietly into her ear as she continued to mutely stare at Barry and the doctor.

"Is there any way you can hit him from a distance?" Jake spoke quizzically.

Tawaya rumbled in her chest and clicked her tusks in satisfaction.

'I like Little Jake's ferocity!' she thought.

Tawaya moved her head forwards slightly, nodding.

Jake made a small smile as he descended from his tip toes.

Tawaya grumbled and moved her right hand slowly.

Barry's eyes darted from Tawaya to Jake rapidly.

Finally Barry's panic got the better of him and he began to yell in madness. He finally pulled his trigger.

When Tawaya had kicked Barry's hand earlier, the force of the kick broke several of his fingers, but it also caused a small crack to form along the length of Barry's weapon.

The shot made the weapon explode in Barry's hand and the trajectory of the bullet soared once again into the roof above its intended target.

Tawaya's right hand descended to take hold of one of her knives and in a quick single action she threw the blade with expert precision across the hall and towards the screaming and injured Barry.

His cries of pain were silenced as the blade embedded itself into his forehead.

Jake watched the skillful display of Tawaya's accuracy with an excited expression of adoration.

'That… was… incredible!' he thought.

"Tawaya! You're amazing!" his voice cried.

He took hold of her left arm and brought his face against her triceps.

She felt the warmth of his soft skin against hers and she looked away from Barry's falling body.

"Little Jake…" she cooed.

"Did she hurt you?" Tawaya's voice asked.

Jake opened his eyes and looked over at the doctor shaking in fear.

"No…"

Tawaya nodded.

"Little Jake, are you okay to stay here?"

He moved his cheek away from her arm to be able to look up at her mask, "What? Where are you going?"

His voice was tinged with fear.

"I have to clean up… They took the bad bloods."

Jake immediately relaxed.

He nodded and spoke, "I think they're in the other room."

Tawaya wordlessly looked back up and took a few steps towards the door leading to the larger room of the building.

The doctor remained still and silent on the floor.

Jake watched Tawaya's strides with disbelief.

'There she is. I can't believe it… She had found me…'

Jake smiled and brought a hand to cover his face. He couldn't help but feel excited.

'Oh my god!' he thought, 'She really came back for me!'

His joy was too much and he raised his voice to call to Tawaya in the other room, "I thought I'd never see you again!"

All he heard was a loud purr and growl in reply.

He giggled at the noise and shook his arms in front of him giddily.

The doctor finally broke her silence.

"You… you really were able to meet and befriend the creature?"

Jake raised an eyebrow, "Ha… more than that. But yeah."

The doctor slowly moved her head from side to side, "You're crazy…"

The young man furrowed his brow and stepped forwards.

Cringing in pain he eventually made his way to the doorway Tawaya had walked through.

"Tawaya, are you going to burn the building down?"

He heard a few loud steps get closer before she appeared in the doorway.

"That's a good idea Little Jake."

Jake smiled.

"Also, what about her?"

He pointed at the doctor on the floor, and immediately the woman raised her hands.

"N-no…" she stuttered, "Hang on… she wants to get rid of everything here right?"

Jake pursed his lips and squinted in disbelief at her.

Tawaya simply stared through her mask silently.

"I'll help destroy all the shit… everything… but you let me live…"

Jake was now looking at the second person who was begging for their life today.

Literally,

She oozed fear.

It was a serious and tense situation… but Jake had watched Tawaya literally kill two people already, and he heard her easily tear apart three others.

It was…

It was deeply affecting to say the least.

Jake had seen first had the fragility of human beings, and the ease with which killing was really done… and by his Tawaya no less!

He didn't know how to feel about it but… in his head he regarded the woman before him with indifference…

He honestly didn't care about any of this shit. Or his mind had walled itself up so as to protect him from what had been happening around him so far…

But he didn't feel strongly about whatever it was that Tawaya chose to do next.

All he cared about was leaving this place, leaving this room, and being with his Yautja…

"Tawaya?" he asked.

She grunted in affirmation at her name.

"Up to you…"


	9. Chapter 9

AEAYII - Chapter Nine

Jake sat on top of a crate watching Tawaya pouring some kind of acid on the Bad Blood's bodies while the sobbing doctor poured the contents of a petrol canister on the floors, boxes, and walls.

The agent, Barry, had purchased enough burgers and enough French fries for almost ten people, and when he threw the bags of fast food to the ground much of their contents had spilled.

-1-

Despite this there was still far more than enough for Jake.

He walked past the frightened doctor and stooped to gather up the bags and the wrapped burgers which had fallen out.

Tawaya was not pleased that Jake had been walking across the glass and debris strewn ground and after she saw that his feet had been bleeding as he picked up the bags of food she wrapped her arms around his waist and carried him into the other room.

He yelled in surprise at the sudden lifting, but he knew that it was Tawaya and in the short distance from the hall to the other room he relaxed and pushed himself back into her chest and arms.

Enjoying the feeling of her arms and body pressed against him.

When Tawaya entered into the room with the Yautja bodies she placed her Little Jake onto a crate to the side of the doorway.

Then she poked her head into the hallway and gruffly clicked and motioned for the doctor to follow.

Tawaya nodded to Jake and when the doctor stepped into the room Tawaya pointed towards an orange Jerry-can by some open supply boxes.

Evidently the female Yautja knew what gasoline-petrol was and what it could do.

-2-

Taking a large bite of a bacon burger Jake pushed the mouthful to the side and called out to Tawaya, his voice was excited and his overall demeanour was entirely jarring to what was currently going on,

"Hey! Tawaya, remember those oink-oinks we talked about before?"

As one of the Bad-Blood's bodies began to slowly dissolve and bubble, leaking and pouring off the sides of the metal table, the large female Yautja looked up from her work and towards her little human.

Wordlessly she nodded.

'How could I forget them? Great prey…' she thought.

Jake immediately smiled, finished chewing, and nodded while pointed to the burger.

"Tawaya there's bacon in a few of these! You remember? I told you I'd get you bacon someday!"

Tawaya's head tilted to the side and her body language gave off a look of disbelief.

'As hungry as I am right now… Really Little Jake? Food is the furthest from our concerns…'

The doctor had stopped mid action and turned to see Jake over her shoulder.

"What the fuck…" she whispered under her breath.

Jake's voice rose in disappointment, "Waah, come on, you've got to try one!"

Tawaya looked to her side at the doctor, having noticed she stopped moving. Immediately the human resumed spraying the petrol and kept her head down.

Rolling her shoulders and wincing from her injuries, Tawaya still had work to do; 'We don't have time Little Jake to be…' She looked at his eyes.

'He was earnestly smiling… and, and he… Oh gods damn it!'

She begrudgingly broke the silence, "In a moment Little Jake…"

The young man nodded and went back to eating his greasy meal. He sighed as he took another bite; "I honestly have never had a burger this good…"

He swallowed another mouthful.

"I suppose thinking you're going to die makes everything a little bit better." He chuckled.

Jake looked up from his hands and at the doctor, "Eh?" he asked, "What do you think doctor?"

The woman shuddered as she sprayed the rest of the fuel onto the door. She dropped the can and turned around slowly, her voice was quiet and she didn't dare look at Tawaya.

"I… I don't know…"

Jake furrowed his brow.

Looking to his side he reached a hand into one of the two, thick, brown paper bags and grabbed a foil-wrapped burger.

Raising his eyebrows comically Jake indicated he was about to toss the small package at the doctor,

"Ready?" he asked rhetorically.

Her eyebrows furrowed and her eyelids fluttered nervously as she anticipated the incoming projectile.

As he threw the foil covered package the doctor sputtered and anxiously reached out her hands reactively. She nearly fumbled the burger but surprisingly she was able to catch it.

The doctor had been an uncoordinated and physically meek nerd her whole life, books, scalpels, reports, x-rays… She could handle those no problems, but get her in the vicinity of a football or a cricket bat and she trip over herself before ever even playing.

Jake smiled and exclaimed, "Hey! Yeah you got it."

She was surprised at herself and for a moment she smiled too.

Taking a smaller bite this time Jake nodded and pushed the food on his tongue over into his cheek to talk, "Oh man you will not be disappointed…"

Continuing to eat Jake just wordlessly nodded, encouraging the doctor along to join him.

The doctor began to eye the food with apprehension, and then she looked at the young man with disbelief. Hearing Tawaya move behind her the doctor dared to look over her shoulder.

Seeing the tall alien again made the doctor's heart skip a beat.

"O-okay…" she stuttered.

Her hands shook as she messily un-wrapped the foil. Mayonnaise and ketchup had squirted out the sides during the burger's travels, either in the air when Jake threw it, or when Barry had dropped them on the ground.

Either way liquid began to run out of the foil and onto her hands.

The sight made the doctor's stomach growl and groan quietly in desperation.

'If I'm going to die here I may as fucking well…' she finally thought.

The burger had shifted around a little bit; its patty had moved and was no longer centred between the buns, its' sauce was dripping out the sides and spilled out the foil and down the woman's' fingers.

A bright green pickle was half visible in front of her, in-between what looked like lettuce; at least she assumed it was lettuce.

She cringed and her thoughts repeated themselves, 'I hope that's lettuce…'

The overall presentation of the food was horrible.

It was probably the greasiest, most unappealing thing the doctor had eaten in recent memory.

'But…' she thought again, 'fuck it…'

She hadn't eaten since her last meeting with Sherbrook. This was hours before Everett, Barry, and Valdez had left…

"Those idiots…" she mumbled.

'We didn't need the kid… we really didn't… But Sherbrook just _had_ to have a live witness…' She stopped mid-action. 'The poor fool…' she thought.

Clearing her mind she shut her eyes and brought the food to her mouth, opening her jaw widely she took a bite and began to eat.

Jake was eating some fries and sighing as Tawaya took care of the last body.

"You know, I'm surprised that the acid doesn't smell…" he said, holding a fry between his fingers like a cigarette.

Tawaya nodded. "It's meant to be so Little Jake…"

Jake nodded and continued eating.

"Why's that?"

Tawaya placed the cap back onto the phial of liquid.

"It makes it like nothing was here."

Jake nodded and chomped down on his cigarette-fry.

The doctor had to admit… it wasn't as bad as it could be… she was still in absolute terror that's for sure! She kept thinking 'am I going to be killed? Or are they actually going to let me go?'

She shook her head and cleared her thoughts.

'Take comfort in the carbs… just enjoy the greasy food…'

The doctor tentatively took a few steps towards Jake.

She swallowed what she had first bitten off and she cleared her throat.

'Be careful though…' she thought, 'this kid's definitely unstable…'

The fact his hair was violently dishevelled, both his wrists were scraped up and raw, he was wearing a hospital gown, _and_ he had several spots of blood smeared on it did not at _all_ help the sight…

Stealing a glance at the Yautja she took a few more steps towards the boy.

"I-is it… okay if I-I sit down?" she finally choked out.

Jake's face registered surprise and he looked to either side on his box.

There was a folding chair that had fallen over to the left side of the large wooden crate he was on.

Pointing to it he nodded. His mouth was full and he struggle to swallow as he attempted to get out words, "O-of co-course!"

The doctor looked at Tawaya again, but the large alien was focusing on her work, seemingly unconcerned with the doctor's movements.

Standing the chair back up properly the doctor sat down in it while shaking.

'Just eat the food… you're going to make it… you're going to make it…'

"Little Jake." The Yautja called.

The doctor stopped and her eyes shot open.

"The humans had more information yes?"

Jake nodded, "Yeah I'm pretty sure they did."

Turning to the doctor Jake raised an eyebrow, "What else did they have?" he asked.

The doctor stuttered, "H-hang on…"

Wrapping the foil back up she finished chewing what she had in her mouth and placed the food on the ground.

-3-

After the Tawaya destroyed the cadavers she and her Little Jake watched the doctor gather each of the agent's cellphones and douse them in petrol.

At Jake's prompting the doctor even took the files that Sherbrook had had stolen from the local police and ran them through the shredder in the office Jake was previously held in.

The whole time Tawaya watched the doctor and stood closely behind her.

After finishing the doctor stuttered severely as she told Tawaya, "T-that's a-all w-we h-had here…"

Tawaya grumbled and the doctor flinched.

Then the alien walked back into the hallway and to her Jake.

Breathing a sigh of relief the doctor followed.

Earlier when Tawaya first entered the autopsy room, after killing the humans and greeting Jake, she gloated over the Yautja bodies and happily severed the head off of the last bad blood.

It now sat on the floor by the crate Jake sat on; it's dull, dead, eyes mutely staring out at nothing…

The doctor looked at the head and gagged.

Even though she had been dissecting one of the corpses earlier, and she had even stripped off their clothes and tribal adornments.

The situation got to her and she immediately felt ill.

Her stomach rumbled with revulsion and she held back a wretch.

'This is so… fucking…' the doctor shuddered. 'This is wrong…'

Jake looked over with slight concern.

"You okay?" he asked.

The doctor nodded and tensely responded, "Y-yes I'm fine…"

She looked forwards towards the female Yautja.

Earlier, when she had first arrived to begin her work the doctor had taken each individual item off the bodies and bagged them in plastic baggies of corresponding size.

She had given a number and an item description to each before packing them into a large grey evidence bin at the end of the autopsy tables.

'All that work…' she thought.

'But it's worth it if you live you idiot!' her inner voice immediately responded.

Touching Jake's shoulder Tawaya clicked and issued a low growl-purr. Jake smiled and touched her hand, returning the gesture.

When she stepped back from him she bent down and took up the decapitated head of the last Bad-Blood and moved to the evidence bin.

The doctor somehow found the courage to speak up, "T-that's everything that was on them in terms of t-technology and ar-armaments…"

Tawaya stopped and turned to look at the doctor.

Tensely the woman held her breath and watched the alien quietly.

Tawaya nodded in acknowledgement and leaned down to put the head into the bin.

The large severed item barely fit into the container, and the dreadlocks spilled over either side of the plastic.

Jake furrowed his brow, "Why do you want the head?" he asked in between bites of yet another fry.

Tawaya leaned down and picked up the bin easily.

Her voice was plain and monotone, "I have the others; I wanted this one as well."

Jake pursed his lips, "Of course… okay then."

All in all, the doctor guessed that the container would have had around fifty pounds of crap in it… coupled with the weight of the head it might have been closer to seventy.

But Tawaya picked it up effortlessly…

The doctor's eyes widened at the ease with which the alien moved.

Despite her fear, despite her uncertain future, the doctor couldn't help but watch with both fascination and unbridled curiosity at the extra-terrestrial that was moving, breathing, and even talking! Right in front of her!

"How do you work?" she ended up blurting out.

Jake furrowed his brow and looked at the doctor in confusion.

Tawaya hadn't heard her or decided not to pay her attention.

Despite not receiving a response the doctor continued to stare in transfixed awe.

Her mind raced as she attempted to analyse the creature.

Tawaya nodded to Jake as she held the container.

Jake made a 'humph' and pointed to the bag of food.

"Come on Tawaya… I mean, it's free."

She made a low rumble sound, and eventually the doctor realised that it was a laugh.

'They… they laugh?' she thought.

Jake continued, "Also… I know the place is doused in petrol… but how are we going to light it?"

He looked at Tawaya for a few seconds before turning to the doctor. Tawaya too turned her head and began looking at the small woman.

Quietly the doctor responded, "I have a l-lighter."

Searching her coat pocket she pulled out a small black disposable plastic lighter.

Jake leaned over to take it and then got down from the box.

As soon as he landed he winced loudly, the cuts in his feet were still fresh and he looked at the female Yautja.

"Hey… uh Tawaya… how are we going to get out of here? It's not like I can walk that far you know…"

Tawaya looked down at the bin of shit and the head she was carrying.

The plain expressionless mask looked back at Jake and the two seemed to silently be in a conversation together.

The doctor stood awkwardly.

The silence was growing until she put her hands into her trouser pockets.

Car keys…

Her eyes opened widely.

"I…" she began. Both Jake and Tawaya looked with interest at the woman.

"I have a rental outside…"

Jake's face became interested and he looked to Tawaya.

"If I give you these keys…" she paused and took a breath, "You'll let me go?"

The alien didn't move but Jake held out his open palm and nodded, "Of course…"

The doctor refused to move, "How do I believe _her_?" she motioned with her head towards the alien and Jake looked over.

The boy chuckled awkwardly, "I think if she really wanted to kill you she'd have done it by now…"

Jake nodded to Tawaya and smirked, "Right Tawaya?" he asked rhetorically.

Wordlessly the Yautja made a single nod in agreement.

The doctor couldn't tell if she should be relieved or not and slowly she began handing the keys over to the young man.

He sniggered, "though I'd run just for good measure…"

The doctor stopped and Jake easily took hold of the key chain.

Her eyes seemed to ask, 'are you serious.' But she didn't wait for a response and as soon as the keys were out of her grasp she bolted towards the door behind her.

Sprinting down the hall and leaping over Barry's corpse the doctor pushed open the doors to the building and began hyperventilating and ecstatically sobbing as she got farther and farther from the horror show that was their former operations building.

'I did it! I'm out!' she thought.

"I'm OUT!" she triumphantly yelled.

"They're not behind me?" She mumbled in disbelief, she turned her head and darted her eyes over her shoulder.

The street was empty and dark and the building was getting further away.

"They're not behind me!"

She began to laugh and cry in equal measure.

"I'm alive!" she yelled.

The doctor kept sprinting until she was several blocks away from the building. 'I'll go as far as I fucking can, and I am _never_ agreeing to a field operation again!'

-4-

After the doctor sprinted out of the room loudly Jake turned to Tawaya, holding back laughter.

Tawaya grunted and clicked her tusks.

"Oh my god did you see her face?" he asked.

Tawaya nodded.

Jake's laughter petered out and he eventually relaxed his arms.

He stared at Tawaya intently.

He half smiled and made a fake laugh before his voice dropped, "You're really here…"

She nodded.

Jake's face appeared pained and he looked away briefly.

"Heh, okay… I know this is crazy but…" he held up the keys and lighter, "Let's blow this place and get out of here."

Tawaya stood quietly.

"I know I don't have my licence on me, but… I can still drive a mean automatic."

He lightly stepped forwards, heading to the door out of the room he waved Tawaya to follow.

"God help us if it's a stick shift…" he laughed.

-5-

Author's note:

Happy new year everyone!

For whatever reason this one was really difficult to write, and I apologise about the short length… But more will be coming at you soon!

As always I'm open to any comments, tips, tricks, or suggestions, and I hope you've enjoyed my stuff so far. If you see any errors of such point them out please! I've got no editor other than spell-check and sometimes I miss stuff ha.

New chapter to come, new works to come, and as always:

Lots of love,

VV


	10. Chapter 10

AEAY II – Chapter Ten

Tawaya set the building alight and after helping her little human outside, they stood for a while and silently watched it begin to burn.

It was surprising, even to the Yautja, that the building burned so easily and so quickly. Looking to her side she watched as Jake's eyes lit with excitement; the flames had begun to lick and roar out of the floor windows and the doorway of the building.

Clutched in Jake's hand were the keys that the doctor had given him.

He adjusted his grip and they jingled enough to draw Tawaya's attention for a moment.

They shared a glance before a loud noise made them look back at the building; the flames had begun to mount and climb through the building towards the second floor and the roof.

Glass cracked and shattered loudly from the increasing heat.

Boards and sections of wall crashed as they fell succumbing to the growing fire burning and now engulfing everything that was inside.

The petrol had done its job of getting the fire going and now the building was feeding the flames everything they needed.

Jake looked on, watching the building with amazement.

'I was literally just in there…' he thought nervously.

He involuntarily laughed, 'I… I was going to die in there…'

Then his mouth began to smile.

'I was going… I was going to be murdered in there after being tortured…'

He nodded, though reality and his fearful imaginings were blending into uncertainty he continued to reassure himself; 'I know it… I just know that's what was going to happen…'

'But…'

He looked to his side.

Tawaya was standing beside him, the orange flames were reflecting in the visor of her expressionless mask, and the warm flickering irregular lighting exaggerated her wounds.

Her body looked painful.

Bandages were wrapped around her, small coverings were adhered to her glistening skin, and dried blood was caked on her forearms.

'She was a fucking mess…' Jake thought. But a pleasant memory came to him and dispelled the second hand pain he was feeling, he thought about the second time that he'd seen her and he smiled even more.

"You came…" he remarked out loud.

At the sound of his voice she turned and looked down at him.

"You came for me…" he repeated.

She nodded wordlessly, and her chest began moving just a bit faster.

From what he could see sweat was beading down her collar and towards her chest. Despite the fact she was made more intimidating in the night, despite her injured and dirty appearance, Jake felt… well.

He didn't really know what he felt.

But it was like a compulsion more than anything else he could identify it as.

He cleared his throat and did his best to clearly say her name, "Tawaya"

His voice had dropped in volume and he darted his eyes away from her mask nervously.

She took a step forwards and then tilted her own head away, like she had suddenly thought better of what she was about to do.

Jake noticed this movement and immediately looked back into the visor of her masked face.

His apprehension of her intimidating form, her injuries, everything, seemed to melt away, and he was instead looking at something- no… someone that he cared about.

As strange as it all was, he cared about her and he enjoyed every second they were spending together.

The young man decided to act; dropping the car keys he spread his arms out widely.

He closed the short distance between them and he wrapped his arms around her again.

She bent to catch the hug and she promptly wrapped her arms around him as she stood back up, easily lifting him off the ground as she intensely pressed him tightly against her.

He pressed his lips against the skin of her neck and began kissing her over and over.

"I missed you Little Jake…" She whispered.

Her voice was rough, like she didn't like speaking at the moment. Inside she was caught between feeling embarrassment at her words and the uncertainty over whether or not she had ruined the moment by talking.

Her tusks twitched in her mask and she pressed her eyes shut as she focused on the feeling of his breath against her skin, his weight in her arms, his hair against her, and his hands on her back.

…

Though she was so happy that he was alright, Tawaya couldn't help but wonder: 'How is he so well recovered?'

Like she affirmed, she was happy that he was alive, she was actually ecstatic, though she couldn't allow herself to really show it. Despite this she couldn't help but look at him with some level of genuine puzzlement.

'How is it he's…' Her eyes widened as she thought; 'When I got him to drink chemical cocktail!'

She rubbed her hands up and down his back.

'That… that is the only thing I could possibly think of!'

Her mind began racing as she began to recollect the moment.

It felt like so much longer ago, but it was only two days.

Though it was perverse she was glad she'd drugged him…

'If I hadn't… then…'

She tightened her grip.

"Ehhgh. T-Tawaya…" he groaned.

'I… won't let him go far from me again…'

She nodded and her shoulders shook as she kept her emotions down.

She pressed one hand below his shoulder blade while touching his hair and the back of his neck with the other.

'I… I'll never let you go Little Jake.'

Her mind raced as she tried to repeat what she had just mentally stated.

'What?' a voice within her shook, 'what are you saying!'

A strange flurry of emotions began to swirl inside her chest and her mind.

'He's a human… you're a Yautja!'

'He's so w-weak! A-and…'

Her mind started committing mental somersaults as it tried to keep an even keel.

'But… I… I can't bear to lose him again. I can't…'

She felt his hands on her tap slightly as she continued to press him closer.

"Tawaya…" he managed to croak out.

'I won't lose him again… and I will never hurt him, or let him be hurt-'

Interrupting her thoughts Jake spoke up as he coughed, "I c-can't breathe all too well… th-the stitches."

She immediately became aware of what she was doing; and despite her intentions her strength was killing him with kindness.

Clicking her tusks and sputtering in guilty embarrassment she quickly relaxed her grip.

'D-do I dare apologise?! I… I'm an idiot!'

She wanted to smack herself in the face for her stupidity but before her thoughts continued in overreaction his soft voice assuaged her stress.

"There…" he chuckled, "That's okay, but earlier you were kind of crushing me!"

She wordlessly nodded her head and gently held him.

He squeezed her and he spoke again, "Despite what just happened… I…"

He stopped, "heh, never mind."

They continued hugging for a few more moments before finally the embrace ended and Tawaya helped lower her human down, slowly of course.

His hands seemed to stay touching her skin for as long as possible, and everything about his body language indicated he did not want to leave her hold.

But he resigned. They had to get out of here.

He coughed and nodded as he finally left her arms.

"Okay…" he began.

Holding the shiny metal charms that the female human had given him Jake smiled, "Ever been in a car before?"

Tawaya shook her head; she'd watched humans and their vehicles before. She'd seen many different modes of transportation that the humans used but being so far from them and without much context she didn't know that they were called, 'car'.

"Which car we will be taking?" she asked quietly.

Jake continued to smile; "Well, do you…" he laughed and raised a hand to his mouth, "Do you think you'll even fit?"

He pointed to one of the human vehicles to their side.

The sedan looked normal but as Jake and Tawaya began walking towards it the human began laughing.

"I'll… I'll open the trunk for your…" he stopped as his voice climbed in pitch and broke in a flurry of giggles.

"For your head… Oh my god… You're going to have an uncomfortable ride!"

Tawaya grumbled and moved back to where they had been standing to pick up the plastic bin with the bad-blood's head and the other Yautja items.

'At least I'm not wearing an open ass dress…' she thought.

The lid of the trunk popped open after Jake pressed a button on the controller attached to the loud charm chain.

Tawaya walked to the storage compartment and lifted her box up and over the lip of the metal edge.

She looked at the non-moving lid with apprehension.

Jake had his hand on the driver's door handle and paused as he watched her continue standing motionless.

"Tawaya?" he asked, his voice had lost the laughter of earlier and was replaced instead with confusion.

She leaned around the trunk lid so he could see her and she pointed to the still open boot of the car.

"It's not closing?" she asked.

He smirked, "You… uh, you've got to you know… push it closed?" with his free hand he pantomimed the action.

"You know… just slam it."

With hesitation Tawaya lightly pushed the lid down with her right hand and went to walk to the left side, but as soon as her hand left the metal the lid immediately sprang back up.

She looked at Jake in embarrassment and tried pushing it again.

But the lid popped right back up.

'What?' she immediately thought, 'why is this contraption hindering me?!'

With both hands she pushed it down and held it for a second before going to walk again.

But as soon as her hands left the metal began to move back up.

Groaning loudly in frustration Tawaya put both her hands back on the lid and looked at Jake who was doing everything he could not to laugh at her.

"Try slamming it." he finally managed out.

Tawaya looked back at the metal lid and roared as she brought it crashing down and through the locking bottom.

The lid's edge crumpled and the metal bent around until it was lodged into the housing below.

Jake continued to hold back his laughter as he opened his door.

"T-that… works…"

As he sat into the car he continued to quietly snigger and giggle.

Walking around to the left side of the car Tawaya now viewed the vessel with both embarrassment and frustrated resentment.

Jake started the engine and moved in his seat with excitement.

Tawaya took hold of the passenger door handle and opened it.

She looked at the cockpit and immediately stopped her forward motion.

"Little Jake?" she asked.

He nodded and leaned over the middle console of the vehicle, "it's okay! Press that button on the door there, it'll move the seat back and maybe give you enough room…"

He laughed again, "Oh man… I'm so sorry… this seemed like such a better idea in my head!"

Tawaya looked mutely at the boy before complying with his suggestion.

The seat groaned as it moved backwards and when it stopped Jake nodded again.

"That's as far as it'll go… but uh. Hang on."

He reached his arm to the side of the chair and pulled a leaver. Giving the small brown handle a few pumping motions the angle of the seat's back moved and it eventually resembled something that Tawaya might have been able to sit in.

She grumbled and growled.

Jake moved from his lean and looked up at her playfully, "Come on… unless you want to walk?"

He raised his eyebrows, "though… I have no idea where I'd be going."

"Fine…" she eventually said lowly.

Crouching Tawaya began to enter into the cabin of the vessel.

'This reminds me of a racing pod it's so tight!'

She sat into the seat and it groaned under her weight. Lifting her legs she huffed and strained to fit them under the glovebox under the passenger airbag and when she stopped her loud movement she looked to her side to see the smirking face of her Little Jake.

"You… are you good?" he asked before giggling.

Pushing his shoulder with her left hand she playfully indulged him, "I am 'good'." Her voice was slightly sarcastic and Jake felt a slight jolt of excitement at the surprise.

He smiled and nodded as he put his hands onto the wheel and prepared to change gears.

"Okay, okay, close the door and we'll be off."

The seating was so awkward that if she were to try and sit comfortably her head and neck would have to bend from the shortness of the roof, so rather than 'sitting' she was actually more like lounging in order to really fit.

After pulling the door closed she turned to nod at her Jake.

"Here we go…"

Putting the car in reverse he began a two point turn to get them out of the building's small parking lot.

But outside the car, over the noise of the engine and Tawaya's grumbling and shuffling, Jake swore he could hear sirens.

Slowly passing through the entrance of the chain link fence circling the lot he pushed the button on his door to lower his window.

"Tawaya do you hear that?" he asked uneasily.

She paused her movement and listened closely before nodding in agreement.

"Okay…" he thought aloud, "it must be fire truck or something- oh shit!"

Tawaya perked up, "What is it Little Jake?"

"What if it's cops too?! Fuck, fuck… we've got to go Tawaya!"

Turning down the first right hand street available Jake began increasing his speed to get them as far away from the blazing building as possible.

"Okay! So… bring up your like… iwatch-android thing on your wrist and GPS us a route out of here."

Tawaya furrowed her brow; though she understood English it was as if he'd just spoken gibberish. As she tried to process the information she blurted out, "What?"

Jake looked to his side and checked his mirrors uneasily as he continued, "I… I have no idea where we are Tawaya… and like… I've only got a 'learners' so…"

His chest moved up and down rapidly, he cringed and let out a laugh nervously.

"Whew… oh man I feel light headed."

Concerned Tawaya rose in her seat as much as was permissible.

Wiping his sweat-slick brow and positioning his hair out of his eyes Jake nodded, "I'll be okay… but… still I don't know where I'm driving and…"

His arm shook slightly, "I'll be honest this neighbourhood isn't looking too good… ha. I'm kinda freaking out Tawaya…"

She nodded, "Quiet Little Jake… It's okay… Slow our moving."

He gave a curt nod, "Got it…"

'Just keep watching your mirrors… thankfully it's late so there's not much traffic… you're fine you're fine… you didn't just light a building on fire…'

Under his breath he mumbled some of his thoughts aloud, but he knew that he had to remain cool.

'Just stay focused on the driving… we'll be fine…'

In her mask Tawaya began analysing the surroundings and she tried to plot a rudimentary route.

"Okay Jake… Where's your family?"

At first he heard the question and nodded. But then he titled his head.

"I…" he stole a glance off the road towards Tawaya.

"I don't know…"

He shuddered and then shook his head, "no, no… stop it!" he whispered.

Tawaya watched him at first uneasily.

His body was exuding emotion, he was losing his composure and she saw his hands nervously wring themselves on the steering wheel.

He was getting red in his cheeks and his brow and arms glistened with sweat.

But…

He kept it together.

"Okay… They were last at the hospital… or… no!"

His sudden 'no' made Tawaya pause and hold her breath in surprise.

"No!" he repeated, somewhat excited. "They would have gone back to the hotel!"

He smiled in excitement at his theory, "That's got to be it!"

Tawaya furrowed her brow and clicked her tusks, "And you're sure of this Little Jake?"

He pursed his lips, "Well… not completely sure but, sure enough!"

He coughed and rubbed his mouth, "And even if I'm wrong I'm sure that I could find at least one of them there!"

"Then… then we could…."

His eyes shot wide open.

"Tawaya!" he exclaimed.

She looked out her window, out the windshield, and then at Jake, she tensed her muscles and was completely confused, "What?!" she roared.

Reading a fist she tried to see whatever it was that made him yell.

"My phone! And all my shit! That would have been taken as evidence!"

He laughed as he slowed the car down.

"They took all the evidence and you put it all into that box!"

Tawaya relaxed and leaned back into her seat. 'Gods above… this human might just be the death of me…'

"I'll be able to call them!"

Bringing the car to a stop down an unlit street Jake opened his door and pointed that Tawaya was to follow.

He quietly yelped when his bare feet touched the cold asphalt but his excitement kept him going.

Tawaya was having a bit of trouble getting herself back out the small doorway of the car but eventually, to the sound of groaning metal, she was able to push herself up from her seat.

Jake came around and laughed when he saw the ruined trunk lid, "Uh, Tawaya I'm going to need your help to open this…"

She nodded as she came closer and with ease she wiggled her fingers under the lip of the bent lid to easily pry it back out of the crumpled metal.

Jake shuddered and then chuckled at the sight of the Yautja head which had moved around in the box as they drove around the last few corners.

It's eyes stared dully right at Jake and he grabbed the edge of the box to move it closer.

"Do you mind… moving your head?"

Tawaya gruffly chuckled as she took up her trophy and placed it down loosely into the trunk beside the evidence box.

Jake nodded in thanks and began his search.

The first layer of evidence bags and items had been smeared with blood from the heads' still wet stump, but after parting these Jake eyed something familiar.

In a see through plastic bag labeled with bright orange letters reading 'Evidencia' he could see black jean material.

"Perfect."

Bring the bag out he ripped it open easily and began searching the pockets of the pants.

'Damn… emptied…'

"Okay they're not in my pants… but while I put these on why don't you open some and see if you could find my stuff?"

Tawaya looked at Jake with a raised eyebrow before relenting.

"What… what am I looking _for_ Little Jake?"

He looked around the street tensely before throwing the gown off over his head.

"My cell phone… wallet… it should be in a bag together…"

Looking down at his chest for the first time since coming to Jake saw a long stitched and somewhat bloody wound down the length of the left side of his chest.

"W-whoa… holy fuck…" he whispered.

He wanted to look at the gnarly gash more but he was literally nude and though it was just his jeans he wanted to be wearing at least something familiar.

Hopping on one foot Jake threw a leg into his black skinny jeans and hastily pulled them up.

Though she was kind of looking for what Jake asked her to Tawaya couldn't help but look over at her human's naked body. She cringed at first when she saw the stitched wounds that he now bore but her chest puffed with gratitude that he had survived them.

She nodded as she pulled more bags out of the box, 'He might even look good with those scars after they heal…'

Zipping his fly and shaking his legs out to get comfortable in his dirt and blood stained clothes Jake smiled.

"Okay! Much better now that my ass isn't hanging out for all to see!" he laughed and then leaned back over to help Tawaya as she sifted through the evidence bags.

"This one?" she asked.

Holding a bag up they could see that there was a phone through the plastic and Jake felt a rush of excitement.

"Maybe!"

Tawaya handed him the bag and he quickly ripped it open.

"Please still have battery… please!"

Picking the iPhone up Jake pressed the lock button and shut his eyes, hoping that it would still have some amount of power left.

When he opened them again his familiar lock-screen picture was there to greet him, and the corner battery display read twenty three percent.

"Yes!" he exclaimed.

"Tawaya! We're in it! We're in it!" he excitedly chanted while touching her left arm.

Unlocking the phone he brought up his contacts and immediately pressed call on his father's number.

"Okay..." he began.

"We'll…"

He looked at Tawaya and his excited expression began to fade.

"uh… I…"

His shoulders shook and a shiver came over his bare torso.

"It's not like I can just bring you home…"

"How… how"

The dial tone rung loudly in his ear and he moved the device away from his head.

Jake pressed his thumb to the glass and ended the call.

"Tawaya."

She nodded her head in affirmation.

"What are we going to do now?"

She had to admit it wasn't a strange question.

What _would_ they do now?

She had saved him, and now they were out.

But; where to from here?

"Tawaya…" he said again.

Though this time she responded verbally, "What is it Little Jake"

"Well… I mean." He scoffed, "I'm fairly certain the family vacation is ruined."

Laughing he continued, "So, I mean what should we do? Where do I go?"

He rubbed his mouth and took a breath as he began to vocalise his thoughts, "Do I go back to the hospital? Do I go to the hotel? Like…"

He pointed at her, not accusatorily but enough to indicate her presence, "What about you?"

There was a noise in a dark alley across the street and Jake turned away hastily.

Tawaya lowered to a crouch, "we should be going Little Jake."

He looked back from the alley uneasily.

"B-but Tawaya…"

"I have a route Little Jake. You will be able to make any decisions later."

He furrowed his brow, "But… a route where?"

"Do you trust me Little Jake?"

The moment was tense, he felt like there was urgency upon him,

Here he was shirtless, shoeless, standing on a nameless street in an unknown town in a foreign country.

He had nearly died…

He was recently faced with very serious men in very serious situations.

He had guns put in his face…

His chest looked like it had been ripped open, and he was beginning to think that he should not have been able to be standing up or feeling as 'okay' as he was.

He stared at the strange female _alien_ in front of him and he pondered the question genuinely.

'Do you trust this… this monstrous… murderous…'

'Jake!' His thoughts seemed to scream, 'You watched her kill people! Like… doesn't that… doesn't that bother you?'

Mentally he tried to really engage with it…

Though he was a young man, though he was only twenty, he had to admit he didn't really have the faculties to process what all had happened.

Or what was still happening…

' _do you trust me?'_

The words echoed in his mind and he began to hear his heartbeat.

The sound rang in his ears and his inner monologue continued with its' incessant annoying voice:

'Jake!' it cried petulantly, 'think about all of this insanity! Do you really… I mean… do you really…'

The voice began to grow fainter with each word.

And then?

His mind was clear.

He sighed.

A weight had been removed from his chest.

Tawaya's voice came through along with the memory of the time on their beach together; _'I shall make you strong Little Jake…'_

'Had she?' he asked himself.

He closed his eyes for a moment and the cold damp asphalt seemed to no longer bother him.

The itchy, uncomfortable, pulling and radiating pain along his chest felt like a scratch…

The cool wind on his exposed torso didn't chill him, even though with his low weight and lack of body fat it should have.

The bloody and visceral rescue he had just gone through… None of it really bothered him.

Then he thought about his worry over the driving… he wanted to cringe in embarrassment.

The cops? He wanted to laugh at himself. 'Jesus Jake… don't be such a faggot…'

What did he really have to worry about? So what if he took a wrong turn… So what if anything?

The noise in his ears dissipated and he could once again hear the distant sirens, the steam from apartment buildings, the hum of the traffic lights the street over, the chirping of crickets and other nocturnal bugs and creatures, the dripping of nearby pipes, the running of water in the sewer below the street…

The loud, but calm, breathing of Tawaya…

In his chest, in his tight and worry ridden heart he finally felt his answer.

Jake looked up into Tawaya's mask and he nodded.

"I trust you."

He said it the same way that he had said it to his exes before.

He said it with wholehearted conviction and honesty, because in his mind, in that moment, and forever, he believed it.

' _I trust you…'_

She curtly nodded and indicated they were to remount and continue on their journey.

He smiled slightly and Tawaya slammed the trunk shut again.

He got back into the driver's seat and closed his door.

She groaned and noisily got into her seat.

"So… Where to?"

She began a purr and pointed straight ahead.

"We go down this for a few more… measures… then we will turn this way."

She moved her hand closer to him and he nodded; "Left?"

She repeated the word, "Left. Yes."

He began revving the engine and directing the car down the road.

"Then what?"

She began taking off her mask and Jake smiled while stirring with excitement.

Once her head was free she immediately looked at him with her bare eyes.

Her cheeks raised and the corners of her eyes crinkled as she offered a Yautja smile.

"Then we will bring you back to your family."

Jake nodded.

He had not resigned himself, but he had mentally given himself over to Tawaya's command utterly and completely.

He knew that he would do _anything_ she asked of him.

He was not going to let her down… not now, and in his mind he vowed; 'not ever…'

This being said he felt some confusion as to the deliverance of him back to his family, and this was from his apprehension over whether or not he'd see her again.

This anxiety of his came through his thoughts and began to show on his face.

"Fear not Little Jake…"

He raised an eyebrow and looked over at the lounging Yautja.

"Oh yeah?" he asked before a nervous chuckle.

She nodded, "Yes… I know what it is you fear."

He wordlessly nodded and kept his eyes on the road as he made the left turn.

"I will always be with you."

She moved some of the adornments on her wrist and indicated his rubber band-merch bracelet.

"And you will always be with me…"

He chuckled, "I can't believe you have that still… I…" he stopped.

"I wish I had of gotten you something, ehhh, a little nicer."

She shook her head and lay down in the seat, relaxing her tired and sore body.

"It is a greater gift than I could have hoped for…"

His voice became low and he nervously asked; "Really?"

She nodded.

"Keep on this straight until I tell you…"

Quietly he agreed, "Okay."

He wasn't used to driving, as he jokingly had mentioned he'd only recently gotten his learners. And the few times that he had driven it was with his friends, and it wasn't to do anything entirely _legal._ But even then he was the guy giving the directions.

He didn't like the responsibility of having to ferry his drunk, high, and loud friends.

But being the navigator was a cool role; it had some responsibility, but lower risk, it was also important and helped make or break a night out.

Even though he wasn't used to the uncertainty of driving down city streets and the strange world that night seemed to turn everything into, he was…

He was okay.

There wasn't a whole lot of stress, and the apprehension he was previously feeling about the near future was, well…

It wasn't as much of an issue really.

He repeated his words from earlier and nodded with confidence; "I trust you Tawaya."

She didn't growl, but it wasn't a purr either.

It was like a guttural, 'humph' and it was positive.

Nonverbal but he knew exactly what she meant.

A few silent moments of driving passed and he smiled.

"So…" he asked.

"I don't imagine you'll want to meet my parents' right?"

Tawaya loudly roared with laughter.

She smacked his shoulder and spread her mandibles widely.

"I think that's a pleasure we can avoid Little Jake…"

Her laughter quieted and she indicated he was to turn right.

"Don't fear Little Jake… As I said"

He nodded and interrupted, "I trust you."

He smiled and took his right hand off the wheel.

Tawaya's left arm was resting along the centre console and her hand sat motionless in Jake's peripheral view.

She watched him with fascination and she allowed him to move her arm.

Jake wrapped his small fingers around her comparatively large hand and squeezed it affectionately.

She had to admit that she wasn't used to such softness.

He tightly held her hand and she closed hers in response.

'Though… such softness.' She moved her arm and looked at the small hand she was now holding.

The human's pale colour contrasted severely with her dark and spotted skin.

'I don't know how to say how I feel…'

She almost snorted, 'What a strange range of colours these humans have… they almost never seem suited to their environment…'

'But they're exotic nonetheless…' She shook her head in disbelief, 'Never thought I'd be one to become xenophilic.'

She looked away from their hands and towards her human, she grunted in affirmation, ' _her_ human.'

"Well Tawaya," Jake announced "Despite everything…"

He looked over at her from the road.

"I'm kind of glad we came on this vacation."

She furrowed her brow.

"Vacation? What is this Little Jake?"

"Oh… uh. A trip, ideally it's supposed to be a 'fun' trip…"

She nodded.

"At first I really, and I mean _really,_ didn't want to come on it. But…"

He squeezed her hand.

"I'm glad I did…"

She purred in response.

"As am I Little Jake…"

…

Author's afterword:

Thank you all for your support, favourites, bookmarks, kudos, alerts, subscriptions, comments, and all. It means a hell of a lot to me that my small story has taken off on such a life of its' own.

While the serious 'story' I'd like to have told about 'a boy and his alien' is pretty much finished I may be adding some scenes after this. That's a big 'maybe' though. However I am glad actually I didn't kill Jake (as I had originally wanted to… ha don't mind me).

But for me the story is kind of finished, emotionally speaking at least, and by that I mean if we were to go back to our high-school English classes for analysis, the two major characters' arcs are done; Tawaya and Jake have developed and affirmed without saying it what they both think of their relationship, and so on. There are some loose ends, but I leave their resolution to you dear reader.

Though I won't bore you with my own analysis of my own work, I do feel as if I have told want I wanted to tell.

That all being said if there remain any questions, or if anyone has a particular scenario request to see T&J react to or deal with don't hesitate to let me know.

I know I'm repeating myself here but, once again, thank you all so very much for your time and attention.

More works to come and as always;

Lots of love,

VV


	11. The Valentine's Day Special!

Author's note:

Hello boils and ghouls! I bet you didn't expect to see this? Huh? This is one of the 'additional' thing's I had in mind when I mentioned I might do more in the future. Consider this 'non-canon' to the overall story, and just a light, smutty, funny little piece because of the holiday recently passed, (I know I missed it, shush.)

But I thought I'd go back to my 'roots'. This did start as a 'porn with plot' and I'll be damned if I'm going to forget that fact!

So lots of smutty, dirty, lemony goodness to be had! After all… it is the day of _loovee_ …

Hopefully I didn't leave in too many errors, I'm pretty sure I got them all but if not point 'em out.

So please enjoy,

EDIT 25/07/2019

Regrettably I have edited out the lemon and pornographic content to adhere to FF guidelines. If you enjoy this story and want to see the porn in its uncensored original state, follow me on Archive of Our Own (Ao3)

Thank you.

An Emo and his Yautja celebrate Valentine's Day!

Jake was breathing heavily as he walked back to his apartment.

He'd never quite explained nor spoken with his family about what had happened on their ill-fated vacation, but they had all survived it and were simply glad to be back 'home'.

Earlier that morning he had popped out of his place for a quick jaunt to the shops.

Tawaya was still sleeping when he left, loudly snoring actually; the biological logistics of such phenomena kind of bothered him, mostly because she didn't have a nose and when he thought about it he wondered how she'd be able to snore in the first place… But he shook his head and set continued walking.

When he had woken up he'd read his phone to see that he'd given himself a reminder:

'Valentine's Day, Get her something sweet!'

And then as quiet as he could he dressed, gathered his wallet, keys, and covered his unwashed hair with a beanie.

There wasn't enough time to shower and he wanted to get out, get her some stuff, and get back hopefully before she had woken up herself.

This particular February was nippy, and snow had piled on the sidewalks outside, making it look like the city plows hadn't even gotten started yet.

Wrapping himself up in a thick scarf and his black ski jacket the thin, emo boy crept out of his and Tawaya's small apartment and quietly closed their door.

He'd succeeded in being quiet enough that he'd snuck up on her before… Mostly to tickle her sides, grope her boobs, or simply give her a surprise hug. Though she didn't show it, it irritated Tawaya that he was getting better at not being heard.

Though she was able to get him back several times…

Her favourite way to, lovingly, prank her little human was to cloak herself and assault him when he was at his computer, headphones on, and intensely focusing on a game or watching a video.

…

A few days ago, while he was playing one of his games with his friends, he'd been in the nude and earlier that day given her a surprise licking when she was trying to cook her breakfast…

But now was a golden opportunity to get back at him…

While he was mid-conversation she came up beside him, cloaked, dropped to a knee and reached over his leg to grab his exposed xxxx.

He yelped loudly but immediately had to hold his breath and remain quiet.

His friends all asked "what the hell was that?" and he lied as he poorly tried to cover it up.

De-cloaking Tawaya slyly looked up at her human as he continued to try and play his game, occasionally responding to his friends or teammates with one word or curt noise based answers.

xxxx

"O-okay guys… I got… I got to take a time out."

Tawaya shook her head 'no' and the two exchanged a comical wordless conversation,

'Are you serious?!' Jake's face seemed to ask.

The Yautja nodded and smiled.

She continued to tease him and even spat into her hand to add to the sadism of it.

Pursing his lips and straining to stay focused Jake began biting his tongue to stay silent.

The sight of the human struggling under her hand was both as hilarious as it was arousing to her.

"Jake you've got bomb… where the hell are you going?!"

Lazily running off target Jake nodded and blinked his eyes as he tried to pay attention, "w-what? Sorry, I… I'm uh…"

Tawaya moved his chair a little bit and pushed herself in between his legs and the desk.

"My uh chair is uh… it doesn't sit right…"

Through his headset Tawaya heard his friend's responses,

"Well who cares dude, get a new chair!"

"Fuck the chair, just focus man; we've nearly won this shit."

Jake winced and nodded as he planted his virtual bomb on 'A' site.

"Right… right I…"

xxxx

The next round started and Jake shook his head…

His team had lost.

The score was at fifteen to nine…

'All they had to do was get one more fuckin' round!' he thought, 'How'd we lose?!'

Unmuting his mic Jake loudly declared, "Uh g-guys I've got to go like now! So can we fuckin win this shit?"

Tawaya growled a Yautja giggle and xxxx.

'Seeing him this flustered is too good…' she thought.

The game dragged on a few more rounds before they finally won.

A few times he swore that his friends had heard him stifle a moan, or Tawaya's loud slurping and growls… But if they had they didn't say anything.

…

Pulling his keys from his jacket pocket he adjusted the hold on his plastic bag filled with 'presents'.

He'd gotten a kind of warming lube, a card, and some chocolates.

Jake was pulling out all the stops I know…

Pushing his key into the door to the apartment's small lobby he then crossed the small hall and to the stairs.

The building wasn't that big, just four stories.

His parents, though disappointed he wanted to move out and into the city, were paying for this apartment and though it was small and yada, yada, he and Tawaya enjoyed access to the roof from an old stairwell at the back of their living room.

To him it was one sick place, Tawaya was adjusting to the small quarters well, she often would take a day or two to cloak and wander to her ship to check up on it and all that, but for the most part she and Jake spent their time together.

His university classes were spread out evenly throughout the week and allowed him ample time to hang out with Tawaya.

Climbing the short flight of stairs to the top floor Jake quietly crept towards his door when their neighbour down the hall, the second resident on the top floor, Mrs. Arura opened her door and began walking down towards the stairs.

The elderly woman was a widower, and probably the sweetest third grandma that Jake could ask for.

Though at this moment he hoped she had her hearing aid in so he wouldn't yell and neither would she.

Just as he reached his door she was coming past him.

Dressed in a massive parka, the tiny woman looked like a cross between an Eskimo and Kenny from South Park.

Pushing her scarf out of the way she loudly greeted her younger neighbour.

"Good morning Mr. Jake! Happy Valentine's Day to you!"

Immediately Jake cringed, 'She's not got her aids in… shit…'

Clearing his throat and pulling down his own scarf Jake loudly responded as clear as he could, "Thank you! You too! Are you going shopping Mrs. Arura?"

She smiled and shook her head, "Oh no! I'm going out shopping honey! Is your sweetie still working those odd hour shifts?"

Jake cringed again, but hid it, he hated having to lie, especially to such a sweet old lady; one who'd helped him out, and even baked him a welcoming pie. But it's not like he could have introduced her to a seven foot tall, massive, amazon, extra-terrestrial female…

"Y-yeah, she's going to be working every night this week and only able to sleep during the day!"

The elder nodded her head and closed her eyes, "Shame… shame, well I hope she's not turning into a vampire! Ha!"

She laughed and softly touched Jake's poufy arm.

"I was a nurse myself son, I know the life."

Jake's expression dropped, 'oh crap…'

"Y-you were?"

Mrs. Arura nodded, "During the War, that's why my ol' hearing is so bad!"

She laughed and continued down the hall.

"Jap shell landed right beside our tent one day!" she laughed again, "Sent me flying and my head a'ring'in."

She turned before she began descending the stairs.

She smiled and pointed comically, "But that's where I met my Alexander…"

The elderly lady sighed, "And I wouldn't trade that for anything."

Jake smiled and she began descending while waving, "You take care of your girl Mr. Jake! There's nothing better in life then finding someone who loves you!"

The little lady disappeared from view and Jake let out a sigh.

'Well… I was not expecting something that wholesome today…' he laughed and finally pushed open his apartment door.

The windows were shut, the blinds were closed and all the lights were off.

He stepped into the darkness and closed the door behind him.

'She's definitely awake…' he thought.

He played along and lowered into a crouch as he threw his scarf and coat to the side of the entrance.

"Where are you…" he called lyrically, "come out come out!"

Slowly he began walking through the gloomy apartment.

He heard the clicking and low growl of a Yautja and he braced himself.

Tawaya lunged at him from behind and easily picked him up.

Jake erupted into a small scream of excitement and a flurry of giggles as she twirled around with him in her arms in a hug.

Burying her face into his neck and shoulder she kissed and blew air onto his skin,

"Ah! Ha… I missed you too hon… How'd you sleep?"

Kissing his neck a few more times the Yautja finally let him go and put her human back on solid ground.

Taking a few steps back she reached for the light switch and the room became illuminated in a soft warm orange.

"I slept well Little Jake." Her voice dropped innocently, "But where did you go? I was wo…"

Jake furrowed his brow and began to smile, "what was that?"

He tossed his bag onto the couch and began moving towards the tall female.

"What did you say?"

Bringing his hands to her nude sides he began running his fingers up and down her skin and she began laughing and play-fighting him off.

"No! S-stop Little Jake!"

Leaning his face to her chest the human began leaving a small trail of kisses along her ribs under her breasts while assaulting her with tickles.

She began laughing loudly and growling as she tried enduring the attack.

"What were you going to say! What word Tawaya? What word!"

She started descending to her knees and Jake easily began pushing her to the round carpet in front of their TV.

Tawaya continued laughing and twitching. She could have easily fought Jake off… In all seriousness she could push him away with one finger… But, she liked this. She liked the playing that they did, the happiness that they were sharing.

And after a few more seconds of his tickling her, she finally gave in, "Okay!"

Playfully hitting Jake's shoulder he finally stopped and sat on his knees beside her.

"Okay… I was going to say worried…"

He nodded in affirmation.

"I woke up and, you weren't in bed so I checked the shower… But you weren't there either…"

Turning back to the couch Jake grabbed his plastic bag and reached his hand in for the card.

"I was going to put this in an envelope but… well… here's as good a place to give it to you."

Tawaya looked at the small piece of card-stock strangely.

"What is this Little Jake?"

He smiled as he reached in for the box of chocolate.

"Well…" he contained an eager grin, "Today is a kind of a holiday."

Tawaya's brow rose and she nodded, "oh."

"Yeah, and this holiday is about, hmm. Well okay so there was this guy named Saint Valentine and he's pretty much become the patron saint of love and couples, and all that. So today is a day that people around the world…"

He sniggered, "Pretty much around the world celebrate being 'in love' and 'in relationships'."

Tawaya opened the small card and looked at it.

The paper sparkled and shone, there were alien symbols covering the two sides of its' inside and her eyes widened at the motif on both pages.

"So it says…" he looked down and his cheeks flared, "It says, 'I love you to the moon and back, hugs and kisses, happy Valentine's Day… L-love Jake…"

Tawaya looked up from the card and immediately leaned forwards to wrap her arms around her small human.

"Ah! Wo-woah!"

She cooed and purred as she shut her eyes and gave him a tight squeeze.

Rubbing her back with his hand he kissed her shoulder and closed his eyes.

Smelling her and breathing happily in the embrace.

"Thank you Little Jake… I don't know what I should give you in return; this is such a pretty gift…"

Breaking off the hug Jake smiled, "Woah, we're not done yet. Here you go!"

Leaning back to pick up the bag he reached his hand in and pulled out a small box of chocolates, she froze as her cheeks flared and her eyes widened.

"Jake this is too much!"

When they had first 'moved in' together Jake began introducing Tawaya to candy…

Of all the ones they'd tried so far her favourite were; Turtles, Glosette Raisins, Sour Berries, and pretty much anything else that was sour…

The small box that Jake held up was purple and Tawaya immediately recognised it: Glosette Raisins.

She shook her head and her eyes crinkled in the corners, "No! Jake I can't this is too much! I did not know this was such a holy-day…"

Jake laughed and shook his head, "Tawaya, it's okay hon."

Reaching his hand into the bag he pulled out the bottle of warming lube.

With a sly grin and a raised eyebrow he held the bottle up, "You can make it up to me later…"

Laughing loudly Jake smiled and Tawaya held her hand to her face, somewhat embarrassed.

Since moving in together she'd also become acquainted with lube, something which definitely added to their sexual activities.

…

(Lemon was here)

…

Quickly rolling out from her and rising to his knees the human giggled and sat opposite the Yautja.

Tawaya's eyes opened in surprise, 'he… he was feinting?!'

He smiled widely and nodded

"I… I have a confession to make babe…"

Tawaya leaned back, apprehensive at his new demeanour.

"I ordered you another present…"

She furrowed her brow in confusion.

"It came a few days ago,"

Leaning past her and towards the night-table he opened his drawer and pulled out a small phallic object.

Clicking a button it started buzzing and he raised his eyebrows in quick succession comically.

"It's called a vibrator…"

Tawaya's eyes widened and she lay back down on the bed as she cooed, "And what does it do?"

Jake smiled widely, "Well… let's just say they're a girl's best friend… better than diamonds anyway!"

He laughed and she made a face of confusion.

"Don't worry about it…" he waved his hand and got closer to her.

"You're going to love this, I'm sure of it…"

…

The Yautja and the human continued loudly moaning and noisily fucking for several hours. Until finally they petered out and laid together in relative quiet.

Panting and covered in sweat Jake rested his head on Tawaya's chest and listened to her rapid heartbeat.

Groaning in a tired voice the Yautja spoke first as she brought a heavy and fatigued arm to wrap around Jake's shoulders.

"Happy… Va-valenteen day…"

Jake giggled and sighed, "C-close enough babe…"

"Hungry, Little… Little Jake?" she weakly asked.

He moved his head.

"What…" she laughed, "I'm not cooking…"

"I'll order a pizza?'

She shut her eyes and growled.

"Yes… that would be very nice…"

Jake shut his eyes and kissed her skin, "Pizza it is then…"

"Hey, Tawaya?"

"Yes?"

"Happy Valentine's Day to you too…"

…


End file.
